Today’s transition to daylight-saving time throughout the United States is one of many fundamental ways that science effects the lives of every person in every community. There are several information sources shed light on this subject.

There is a potential effect of daylight-saving time on a person’s health. A 2008 study published by the New England Journal of Medicine states that heart attack deaths and hospitalizations the day after clocks are turned back one hour decrease five percent. Scientists also believe that losing an hour of sleep when clocks turn back an hour in the spring can harm a person’s health.



Many people experience changes in their sleep pattern and energy levels when we turn our clocks back or ahead an hour. The director of the Sleep to Live Institute in Mebane, N.C., explains how these changes affect a human body’s natural rhythms.

So why is daylight-saving time considered necessary? A Wired.com article by Rhett Allain, Associate Professor of Physics at Southeastern Louisiana University, explores how the answer involves the physics of our solar system’s sun.