Continue your time wasting at work thirst for knowledge about the benefits of napping from Dr. Sara Mednick, a doctor in the Department of Psychiatry at the University of California, San Diego. Her blog, Take a Nap has answers to our questions about sleep, how it benefits us, and the effects not doing it have on our bodies.

Miriam asks: What about having a lot of trouble waking up from an afternoon nap, even after a poor night’s sleep? I often find myself feeling extra groggy and dim, the opposite of what I hope for!

Miriam’s problem it turns out is sleep inertia.

Miriam feels “dim” upon waking from a nap because she is vulnerable to sleep inertia. That foggy-headed feeling is her brain’s way of pushing Miriam to reconsider her napping habits. Its likely that Miriam needs to nap for shorter duration so that she avoids slipping into deep slow wave sleep. My husband has the same tendency; he gets much more benefit from 10-15 minutes of rest, than 30 to 60.

There are insightful responses to many questions posed by readers and the Dr. Mednick is open to answering good questions as they come in. It’s important to stay sharp through napping and improving your sleeping skills is essential for good rest and a healthy heart.

[photo by: Daveybot]

Scientists in Israel have found that napping for 90 minutes helps the brain to process new information and retain recently learned things too.

The study, published in Nature Neuroscience, found participants allowed a 90-minute nap between learning the first task and the second task, did not show much improvement in the evening, but did show a marked performance improvement on the following morning.

Although the effects may not be immediate, the benefits of napping and sleep are becoming more clear every day. Sleep helps to improve your mood, increase work productivity, and keeps your kids from getting fat. Plus it feels good, who can argue with that?

[photo by: thepretenda] UPDATED [1/11]: Follow the discussion about this post on Lifehacker.