Night milk effective natural sleep aid

Sleep problems? Drinking cow milk collected during night time (night milk) can help you have a good night's sleep without popping any pill, suggests new research.

According to researchers from the Uimyung Research Institute for Neuroscience in South Korea, milk collected during night time has exceptionally rich amounts of tryptophan and melatonin.

Melatonin is a naturally occurring hormone which helps regulate the sleep and wake cycle, and tryptophan can be converted to serotonin and melatonin For the study, mice were given night milk, day milk, water or diazepam, and then put on a rotating cylinder for 20 minutes.

The drowsier mice had hard time staying on the cylinder, while the more alert ones would fare better and an hour after consuming the night milk, they were significantly less active than those given day milk. "Milk has long been known and used to promote sleep," the research team was quoted as saying.

"The sleep-promoting effect of milk has been attributed to its psychological associations (the memory of a mother giving milk at bedtime) and its rich store of sleep-promoting components,” the researchers explained.

"These findings suggest that night milk might be an effective natural sleep aid for managing sleep-related disturbances and a promising alternative for the treatment of anxiety disorders," the study said. (The research was published in the Journal of Medicinal Food.)