Sleep is indispensable for physical, mental and emotional well being, and any discrepancy in sleep should be cared for immediately. If you stay awake at night and counting the stars does not help you fall asleep, you may not be in for just a dozy day ahead but also putting yourself at jeopardy for heart diseases, depression, obesity and even diabetes.

Various researches have linked sleep complaints to Insomnia; obesity in adolescents and young adults has been linked to depression and substance abuse. Doctors also accept as true in sufficient sleep may induce development of insulin resistance.

Scientists tell us that our bodies alternate between two types of sleep. In the first type, brain activity slows as the body enters an especially deep sleep. In the second type, known as REM sleep (rapid-eye movement sleep), our eyes flutter rapidly under their lids (hence the name) - and our brains become almost as active as they are when we're awake. This is the period, also when we dreams.

Sleep is necessary for every living creature and this includes snails, slugs and even flies. You may be watched your dog take a quick nap or may have seen lions dozing at the zoo. But the length of time an insect sleeps varies widely. While elephants and Giraffes sleep only about two to four hours a day, bats and opossums may nod off for up to 20 hrs.

All land mammals experience REM sleep. Researchers say that the duck-billed platypus has spectacular REM sleep - twitching its beak and legs throughout this stage. On the other hand dolphins and whales do not experience REM sleep and scientists have been trying to figure out the reason for this. But this is not the only puzzling thing about the sleep habits of these creatures. The second misery is that just half of their brain dozes - and one eye closes - at a time. Scientists think that it is one way in which they protect themselves - by staying partially asleep. Ducks do similar things. When they slumber together, the birds at the edge of the group sleep with the eye on the outside open and half their brain awake! Other birds can sleep while flying! However, scientists agree that sleep is also a way for animals to save energy and stay out of harm's way.

All this suggests that sleep is crucial to our lives. Some research says that it is very necessary for learning and forming permanent memories.

The researchers found that one who has with insomnia, and objectively measured , severely short sleep duration of less than five hours had a risk for hypertension that was 500 per cent higher than persons without insomnia who slept more than six hours.

People with insomnia and rather short sleep duration of five to six hours had a danger for hypertension that was 350 per cent higher than those who sleep normal. On contrary, neither insomnia with a normal sleep duration of more than six hours nor a short sleep duration without a sleep grievance was connected with a significant risk for hypertension. This indicates that there is a preservative or synergistic effect on hypertension risk when insomnia occurs in mixture with short sleep duration.

Even though the cross-sectional character of the study did not allow for causality to be resolute, the researchers note that large amounts of clinical and research data point out that it is most likely that insomnia guides to hypertension.