Creatine may decrease the amount of sleep you need. And if you do not sleep enough, creatine ensures that you are still alert. This is suggested by an animal study that Markus Dworak, a Harvard University neurologist, published in the Journal of Sleep Research.
Needing less sleep
The researchers measured the sleep pattern of a group of lab rats under normal conditions [BL], and did the same a second time after the animals had been given creatine in their food for 4 weeks [Cr].
In the laboratory, the light was on [Light Period] for 12 hours a day and the light was off [Dark Period] for 12 hours. Mice are nocturnal animals and therefore prefer to sleep during the Light Period.
Creatine supplementation reduced the amount of sleep during the Light Period.
Less sleepy
In another series of experiments, the researchers kept the rats awake for the first half of the Light Period [SD]. So they built up sleep pressure. The researchers then measured how much the rats slept during the second half of their sleep period [RS].
The researchers did this twice. The one time under normal circumstances, and the second time after 4 weeks of creatine supplementation.
The figure below tells you that creatine reduced the amount of sleep during the second half of the Light Period. Creatine apparently made the test animals less sleepy after a period of sleep deprivation.
Taken together, the experiments suggest that creatine supplementation decreases the need for sleep.
Mechanism
The researchers were able to show that supplementation increased the amount of creatine in the brains of the lab rats. As a result, the brain cells apparently have more molecular energy available to repair themselves, and they need less sleep to recover.
Source:
J Sleep Res. 2017 June;26(3):377-85.
