Japan Office

Russell Foster, Professor of Circadian Neuroscience, Fellow of Brasenose College

An internal 24 hour biological clock (circadian clock) controls, modulates and fine-tunes our sleep patterns, alertness, mood, physical strength, blood pressure, and every other aspect of our biology. The past decade has witnessed remarkable progress in understanding how the brain generates our circadian rhythms and sleep patterns. In parallel with our increasing understanding of mechanisms, there is a growing appreciation of the severe consequences of ignoring the impact of these rhythms on our physiology, health and quality of life. This lecture will consider how circadian rhythms are generated and regulated by light, and why we can’t ignore this fundamental part of our biology in terms of individual health and how we organize our society.

Russell Foster is Professor of Circadian Neuroscience, Head of the Nuffield Laboratory of Ophthalmology and Director of the Sleep and Circadian Neuroscience at the University of Oxford. He is a Fellow of Brasenose College. His research span the neurosciences, but with a focus on the regulation and generation of sleep and circadian rhythms, and what happens when these systems go wrong across multiple areas of health. He has published extensively and is the recipient of many prizes and honours. He has also written four popular science books on sleep and circadian rhythms.