Exploring the Science of Sleep, Empowering a Healthy Future--GIFT "Sleep and Health" Summer Research Program Concludes Successfully

On July 8, 2025, GIFT "Sleep and Health" summer scientific program successfully concluded after 8-day activities. The program brought together students from diverse educational backgrounds, adopting a progressive "Theory Building, Hands-on Practice, Data Analysis" training model to help participants build a systematic understanding of sleep health and explore a new pathway to interdisciplinary talent development.

Theory Building: Sleep Science and Knowledge

The program began with a introductory lecture on sleep stages and theoretical frameworks. Under the guidance of instructor Ji CHEN, students studied the architecture of sleep cycles and professional concepts of sleep stages (N1-N3 and REM), and gained insights into the definition and key indicator of sleep, as well as the adverse effects of sleep deprivation on cognition and emotional well-being.

Professor Wang Xiang conducted a lecture on psychological evaluation tools and their applications, introducing the development history and significant events of psychological evaluation to the students. He meticulously explained the usage of psychological questionnaires and the creation process of some classic ones, which effectively helped the students fill gaps in their foundational knowledge of psychology and deepened their means of self-understanding.

He Miao from the Smart Sleep and Brain Health Laboratory guided students in a hands-on experience with polysomnography (PSG), a key device in sleep research, explaining its principles and clinical applications, as well as demonstrating the process of equipment placement and data collection. Peng Chen focused on sleep and memory, illustrating the process of how sleep enhances memory retention. This session provided a tangible understanding of the crucial role sleep plays in maintaining brain health.

Hands-on Experience: Visits and Interactive Learning

At the Brain Health Education Base of Shanghai Mental Health Center, the team explored exhibits on brain structure and diseases, observed classic experiments like the "water maze" and experienced VR interventions for phobia therapy. Students gained an intuitive comprehension of the structure and function of brain and the research paradigms of brain diseases.

The practice team also visited the Exercise and Health Lab at the Institute of Transformation Medicine. Under the guidance of Professor Cheng Shulin, Director of the Centre for Future Health and Intelligent Exercise, students carried out their practical activities. Associate Researcher Wang Xiuqiang led the students on a lab tour, explaining the importance of exercise, particularly debunking common fitness misconceptions (BMI, body fat percentage and waist-to-hip ratio), and developed personalized exercise plans based on each student's body composition analysis.

At Sleep Center of Huashan Hospital, participants witnessed PSG clinical operations and learned about complete clinical diagnosis and treatment process of sleep medicine through real cases. Specialized clinicians shared common symptoms of sleep disorders such as narcolepsy and obstructive sleep apnea(OSA), while also explaining interpretation techniques for various physiological signals. Back in the lab, students practiced PSG setup and compared it with wearable sleep trackers.

Data Analysis: Extracting Insights

During the technical practice session, the research team conducted a sleep data analysis workshop. Guided by lab researchers He Miao, Cen Haolin and Hu Junkai, students learned about various data types and mastered preprocessing workflows such as data loading, cleaning and feature extraction, then performed statistical and correlation analysis. By examining massive datasets to explore relationships between deep sleep and total sleep time, students uncovered sleep patterns while enhancing their data processing capabilities.

Closing Ceremony: Achievements and Expectation

At the final presentation, faculty judges including Deputy Party Secretary Han Haibo, Associate Researcher Wu Mengyue from School of Computer Science, Student Counsellor Feng Bohan, Associate Professor Chen Ji, Liu Yang and Researcher Lan Zhaohui from Center for Brain Health and Brain Technology commended participants for applying their professional knowledge and skills: in health management, they optimized personal sleep schedules and alarm settings using sleep cycle theory; in research capacity building, they mastered fundamental sleep data analysis methods and created clear data visualizations; in academic interest development, they generated preliminary research ideas on mechanisms of sleep-disordered breathing and other diseases.

Outstanding participants received certificates.

Moving forward, GIFT will continue to leverage its multidisciplinary strengths and industry partnerships to transform sleep research into real-world health solutions, making contributions to enhance national health standards.