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Yes! The astronauts are real and are investors in Timeshifter.

Former NASA Astronaut and Chief Astronaut at Axiom Space, Commander Michael López-Alegría, has completed five space missions on Space X, Space Shuttle, and Soyuz. He holds NASA records for most extravehicular activities (EVAs) or ”spacewalks” (10), cumulative EVA time (67 hours, 40 minutes), and for the 3rd longest spaceflight at 215 days!

Another legendary astronaut you might have seen on our site is Professor Mike Massimino. Mike has successfully completed two of the hardest space missions – both to repair the Hubble Space Telescope. He also was the first person to tweet from space! Today, Mike is a Professor of Mechanical Engineering at Columbia University.

Another one of our investors, Dr. Smith Johnston, is a former NASA flight surgeon and Chief Medical Officer at Axiom Space. He was the head of the Fatigue and Longevity Programs at NASA for many years and developed the first circadian desynchrony program to help NASA astronauts and mission controllers manage jet lag, shift work disorder and circadian challenges during space light. Our Chief Scientist, Dr. Steven W. Lockley, continues to assist NASA today.

Timeshifter is tightly connected with astronauts because circadian science has been a critical part of enhancing the safety and performance of astronauts on space missions for many decades, as NASA understand the critical importance of circadian rhythm management to reduce the safety and health risks of clock disruption. Circadian plans are carefully crafted to help astronauts reduce jet lag when traveling for training visits, align with rocket launch and spacewalk timing, and control their day-night cycle when living aboard the International Space Station, including shifting their schedules for space walks, docking and undocking. Mission controllers are provided with circadian plans to support these missions 24/7, without compromising anyone’s safety.

Like food, exercise is also a very weak circadian synchronizer, so it doesn’t help reset your circadian clock. The time at which you exercise may also lead you to see light at the wrong time and shift your clock in the wrong direction, making your jet lag worse. Exercise has to be timed as part of the overall light-dark exposure plan.

Many claims have been made about diets or fasting being able to reset the clock. These claims are based on studies of nocturnal (night-active) rodents which cannot easily be translated to (day-active) humans. Food does not reset the circadian clock in the brain and there is currently no accepted method for using food — or fasting — for resetting circadian rhythms.

The evidence for this is found in studies of totally blind people, who Dr. Lockley has studied extensively. Totally blind people have no light information reaching the brain and therefore cannot synchronize the circadian rhythms to the 24-hour day. This results in a clinical disorder called non-24-hour sleep-wake disorder. They still get this disorder even though they eat their meals on a regular 24-hour pattern; if food could reset their circadian clock, they would not develop non-24-hour sleep-wake disorder, yet they do, showing that food is not an effective method to reset the clock.  

While advice on what and when to eat may be helpful in reducing the metabolic consequences of jet lag, caused by eating at the wrong biological time, it will not alleviate the underlying cause.

Sleep equals dark as far as the circadian clock is concerned – when you close your eyes to sleep, you block light information going from the eyes to the brain - so if you sleep at a time when you should be seeing light, you will shift your circadian clock in the wrong direction and make jet lag worse. Advice focused only on sleep, without resetting the circadian clock, assumes that insomnia and sleepiness are the only symptoms of jet lag, which is not the case. Sleep (and therefore dark) timing should be scheduled as part of the overall light-dark exposure plan designed to reset the circadian clock, and end jet lag, as quickly as possible.

Jet lag is a disruption of our internal 24-hour circadian clock, which regulates almost every biological system in our bodies. As a consequence, jet lag is disrupting our entire biology — from our sleep-wake cycle, mood and performance patterns to our metabolic, immune, and reproductive systems.

Jet lag causes a wide range of symptoms and significant human and financial costs:

• Insomnia
• Poor concentration
• Reduced performance
• Compromised safety
• Less enjoyment
• Needing to leave earlier than wanted to gradually acclimatize to the new time zone
• Long recovery time when back home
• Weakened immune system
• Long-term health implications

Any jet lag ‘solution’ that does not have light and light avoidance as the central planks of the advice will not help you adapt to new time zones faster. Some advice may aim at improving sleep or reducing sleepiness, but this is not addressing the circadian rhythm disruption which is the underlying cause of jet lag — a little like treating a fever without addressing the underlying infection. This may seem to help in the short-term but is not the most efficient or effective solution and does not address other consequences of jet lag such as digestive disorders and immune problems.

Given that appropriately timed light exposure and light avoidance are the only proven way to alleviate jet lag, many of the common ‘tips’ are either ineffective or may even make your jet lag worse. For example, knocking yourself out with sleeping pills, or getting on the new time zone as quickly as possible, or following the light-dark pattern on the plane, do not work.

Timeshifter uniquely combines the only elements shown to reset the circadian clock (light-dark exposure and melatonin supplements), and alleviate the symptoms (light, melatonin, caffeine, naps), and not surprisingly, the sum of their effects is greater than the individual parts.

Timeshifter is built on circadian neuroscience and uses the same science-based algorithms that NASA used to help astronauts and mission controllers manage circadian disruption. Based on 129,852 post-travel surveys, travelers who followed the advice were 14.1 times less likely to report very severe jet lag compared to those who did not follow the advice, and 96.4% of users cross time zones without feeling jet lagged.

Our Co-Founder and Chief Scientist is Steven W. Lockley, Ph.D. He has served on the Harvard Medical School faculty for over 20 years and was previously a neuroscientist at Brigham and Women's Hospital. With nearly 30 years of research experience, he is an international authority on circadian rhythms and sleep, and helps NASA astronauts and mission controllers, Formula 1 drivers, NBA players, and Olympic athletes perform at their best.

References:

1. St Hilaire MA, Gooley JJ, Khalsa SB, Kronauer RE, Czeisler CA, Lockley SW. Human phase response curve to a 1 h pulse of bright white light. J Physiol. 2012 Jul 1;590(13):3035-45.
2. Meyer N, Harvey AG, Lockley SW, Dijk DJ. Circadian rhythms and disorders of the timing of sleep. Lancet. 2022 Sep 24;400(10357):1061-1078.
3. Eastman CI, Burgess HJ. How to travel the world without jet lag. Sleep Med Clin. 2009 Jun;4(2):241-255.
4. Czeisler CA, Duffy JF, Shanahan TL, Brown EN, Mitchell JF, Rimmer DW, Ronda JM, Silva EJ, Allan JS, Emens JS, Dijk DJ, Kronauer RE. Stability, precision, and near-24-hour period of the human circadian pacemaker. Science. 1999 Jun 25;284(5423):2177-81.
5. Sack RL, Auckley D, Auger RR, Carskadon MA, Wright KP Jr, Vitiello MV, Zhdanova IV. Circadian rhythm sleep disorders: part I, basic principles, shift work and jet lag disorders. An American Academy of Sleep Medicine review. Sleep. 2007 Nov;30(11):1460-83.