Dr Michelle Dickinson: nanotechnologist on the research revealing why it's harder to wake up on some mornings

Most of us know the feeling: the alarm rings and you either spring out of bed ready to face the day, or you groggily fumble for the snooze button. 

But why does waking up feel so different from day to day? 

New research published in the journal Current Biology has revealed what’s happening inside the brain during those first few seconds of waking up. 

Using high-density EEG (electroencephalography) to record over 1,000 awakenings, they discovered a consistent pattern of brain activity that helps explain why we feel alert or not after sleep. 

The researchers found that waking up is not like flipping a switch. Instead, it’s more like a wave rippling through the brain, with certain regions turning on before others. 

The found that: 

The front of your brain (prefrontal cortex) wakes up first. This area is responsible for decision-making and attention. 

The back of your brain (visual and sensory areas) lags behind by a few seconds. 

If you're waking from deep (NREM) sleep, your brain shows a brief burst of slow brain waves (delta waves), a kind of transition signal before ramping up to faster, more alert-like activity. 

Waking from REM sleep, by contrast, skips the slow-wave burst and jumps straight into high-frequency activity. 

The team also found that this order was consistent across different types of awakenings, whether spontaneous or caused by an alarm. 

Participants who had a strong slow-wave signal (linked to a type of brain wave called a K-complex) just before waking were less sleepy once awake. 

It seems that a little bit of “sleep-like” brain activity right before you wake up might help you feel more alert. These waves seem to act like a “reset” signal that prepares your brain for the shift into wakefulness. 

But too much of another type of slow brain activity (called “type II” slow waves) right before or after waking? That was linked to feeling groggier. 

In short: 

Helpful slow waves (type I): Lead to more alert wake-ups. 

Unhelpful slow waves (type II): Make you feel sluggish. 

So, how can you apply these findings to your own mornings? Here is what the research found: 

1. Wake Up at the Right Sleep Stage 

Use a sleep tracker or app that wakes you up during light sleep (N2 stage) if possible. Waking during REM or deep sleep increases the chance of grogginess. 

2. Use Gradual Alarm Sounds 

Loud, jarring alarms can skip over the natural slow-wave transition, especially in REM sleep. Try gentle sounds or wake-up lights that simulate sunrise to help your brain transition naturally. 

3. Consistency is Key 

Stick to a regular sleep schedule. The more your brain is in sync with your circadian rhythm, the more likely it will initiate a healthy wake-up sequence. 

4. Get Moving Quickly 

Since your brain finishes “waking up” from front to back, physical movement (even just sitting up or stretching) can help speed up the rest of the brain’s activation. 

5. Don’t Snooze Too Much 

Snoozing might send your brain back into deeper sleep stages, increasing the odds of waking up groggy when the alarm rings again. One solid wake-up is better than several mini ones. 

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:06):
You're listening to the Sunday Session podcast with Francesca Rudgin
from News Talks edb Right.

Speaker 2 (00:13):
In our science study this week, Doctor Michel Dickinson, here's
something that I do think about quite often when the
alarm goes off and you stagger around a bed and
you think yourself, of course, I've heard them best sleep
in the world. Why am I not like, I don't know,
skipping around the house. Michelle, tell me about the study.
Where did you find this?

Speaker 3 (00:31):
So this has just been published this week in the
journal Current Biology. It's open source if you want to
read it. It's quite meaty, but go ahead and I
might actually send you to sleep. But anyway, it is
a study that tries to understand the question, which is
why is it Some mornings you wake up and you're like,
I'm ready for a day, let's jump out of bed.
It's great. And the mornings you wake up and you're like, oh,

(00:51):
I can't based on me, I got a snooze twenty times,
and yet you've had sort of the same amount of sleep,
and so they go, well, if you've had the same
hours of sleep and your sleep's been pretty consistent, it
must be something to do. With how you wake up
or what part of your sleep cycle you're waking up on.
So they talk all these volatiers and they put this
EG on their brain. So they put a really sensitive

(01:13):
EG that was measuring very sensitively your brain waves on
what's going on. And they put these volunteers to sleep
in a room and they measured their brain waves and
then they either woke them up pretty startlingly with a
loud alarm or they let them wake up naturally and
they looked at what the brain waves are doing. And
they did this for over one thousand awakenings, so it's
quite a lot of time these people are just spend

(01:35):
falling asleep and then being woken up again. And what
they found is actually interesting. They found that your brain
doesn't wake up at the same time, so different parts
of your brain wake up at different times.

Speaker 1 (01:48):
That makes sense.

Speaker 3 (01:49):
Yeah, So mostly the front part, the prefrontal cortex, wakes
up first, and that's your alert system that you'll like
make decisions that you'll flight or fright, what we're going
to do, and then it's sort of like a wave
and a few seconds later, the back of your brain,
which is your visual and your century part of your
brain wakes up later. And what they found is the

(02:10):
reason why you feel bright and chirpy or not is
to do with which part of your brain is waking
up first, how fast it takes that wave to ripple.
And it was really interesting. So they said that if
you are waking up from an RAM type of sleep,
which is why you're sort of dreaming where you remember
some of your dreams, that is going to be where

(02:32):
you wake up groggy. And if you wake up from
a deep sleep, you're also going to wake up groggy.
And they measure this by these different K waves and
one and two type waves like that. Technical stuff doesn't matter,
but what they said is you really need to be
in a light sleep but not dreaming to wake up fresh.
And so they said, well, how do you do that?

(02:53):
And they said most people when they set their alarm,
they have a loud alarm that startles them awake, right,
And so what you're doing is you're either in an
RAM or you're in a deep sleep, and then what
you're going to do is you're going to suddenly jot
yourself awake and your brain isn't ready for it, and
that's what makes you wake up gruggy. So they said,
what we've learned is tricks for how you wake up
fresh every morning. So these tricks based on this study

(03:14):
are Number one, use a sleep tracker. Now that you
can get free apps on your phone if you want
to do this, or you can wear one of these
rings or whatever. Basically, what that does is it trecks
whether you're in em sleep, deep sleep, or light sleep,
and it sets an alarm that only gently goes off
when you're in that light sleep stage, so it's going
to mean you wake up nice and fresh. Number two,

(03:36):
don't use a one off alarm that goes even like
hunks you awake. Use a gradual alarm or what are
those sunrise alarms? I don't know you've seen them, but
they start like putting a light onto your face gently
to wake you up slowly, because that's going to allow
your brain waves to transition slowly and naturally rather than
jop you awaken like everything's on fire. Number three usual consistency.
Have a good sleep cycle like it's good. It's called

(03:58):
sleep hygiene, and try and go to bed at the
same time. Try and like you know, not have your
phone and your bed blah blah blah. Number four, this
is a good one. As soon as you you wake up,
sit up and stretch key key, and you're like, well,
why would.

Speaker 1 (04:11):
You do it?

Speaker 3 (04:12):
And I watched my dog do this all the time,
like why is it when my dog wakes up? But
the first thing does is he stretches. Well, it's actually
what it does is it's waking up the back part
of your brain much more quickly and activating your brain
wave to move from the front to the back more quickly,
which means that you're going to wake up better. And
number five, don't snooze. Don't snooze because when you snooze,
you end up falling back to sleep and you can
ed up lose, you lose, you can end up in

(04:33):
a deeper sleep pattern, which the next time you wake
up you're even more gruggy, So really easy. Basically, I
love the description of the brain waking up at different times,
because you know, sometimes you wake up and you're just
not sure what's going on.

Speaker 2 (04:46):
You siddenly, I don't know, I don't know what the
diet does, I don't know what's it. And I feel
so much more reassured by that, And I'm just going
to wake up and go. You're you're awake for a
reason and all become clear in a moment. Just get
up and streech and get up and stretch. I think
I like the idea too of the gradual alarm sounds,
but I know exactly how that will go and my house,
which will mean that my partner will use it, and

(05:06):
it will probably go for two minutes before you finally
realizes actually that's his alarm.

Speaker 3 (05:11):
My partner has it, and it goes for ten and
like it wakes me up in the earliest setting, and
then ten minutes later he's like, oh, is that my alarm?
I'm like, yeah, so yeah, if you are sharing a bed,
if somebody just know that, if somebody's a light sleeper
me and your partner isn't, it might take them a
little while to hear it.

Speaker 2 (05:28):
Is it common to dream? I don't know. I'm just
thinking I'm often only because these are the dreams you remember,
the dreams that you have just before you wake up,
So it is quite common. I think, isn't it a
dream just before.

Speaker 3 (05:37):
You Yeah, because you're in that ram late sleep stage,
and depending on where you wake up depends on whether
you remember it or not. So you want to be
in the light sleep, not the ram sleep, and then
you wake up fresh.

Speaker 2 (05:47):
So try it.

Speaker 3 (05:47):
Okay, baby tips and it's current biology if you want
to read the science.

Speaker 2 (05:51):
Brilliant. Thank you so much, Michelle really appreciate it. So
those tips. Wake up at the right sleep stage, use
a gradual alarm sounds. Consistency is key when it comes
to your sleep schedule. Get moving quickly, wake up, set up, stretch,
and don't snooze too much. I love it. Thank you
so much.

Speaker 1 (06:08):
For more from the Sunday session with Francesca Rudkin, listen
live to News Talks it B from nine am Sunday,
or follow the podcast on iHeartRadio