SRI International’s Human Sleep Research Program is recognized for its dual expertise in conducting basic/clinical research studies as well as applied research and development (R&D) commercial work in the sleep tech space. The lab utilizes state-of-the-art equipment, observational and interventional designs, multidimensional data approaches and advanced analytics to conduct basic and translational research projects about sleep, brain functioning, and related physiology.

Basic and clinical science
Our work includes several National Institutes of Health (NIH)-sponsored studies. We are investigating psychophysiological mechanisms underlying insomnia pathophysiology in adolescents and mid-life women using interventional and observational designs. Other areas of interest include:
- Developmental changes in sleep and brain structure and function across adolescence
- Links between sleep and memory in women
- The impact of pre-sleep psychophysiological manipulations (e.g., stress, alcohol intake) on sleep and cardiovascular regulation during sleep.
We use a wide range of innovative techniques including EEG, impedance technology, MRI and beat-to-beat blood pressure monitoring to gather physiological data which is further analyzed using sophisticated analytical techniques. These data are frequently combined with clinical and behavioral neuropsychological data.
Applied science and sleep technology
The Translational Sleep Technology Unit of the Human Sleep Research Program at SRI focuses on advancing science while also discovering and developing novel approaches and technologies to improve people’s sleep health and well-being. We also conduct validation and product development studies for commercial clients, particularly in the wearable technology space.
Recent reports and publications
Basic science & consortium studies grants
SRI’s Human Sleep Research Lab has a diverse portfolio of research and clinical NIH-funded studies.
National Consortium on Alcohol and NeuroDevelopment in Adolescence (N-CANDA)
N-CANDA is a multi-site longitudinal, adolescent development and behavior study which commenced in 2012 and has enrolled 831 volunteers between the ages of 12-21. The study is funded by the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA). It investigates changes in brain structure and function across development in relation to changes in behavior, sleep, and alcohol use.
Ncanda.org
Adolescent Brain Cognitive Development Study
The Adolescent Brain Cognitive Development (ABCD) study, funded by NIH, is the largest long-term study of brain development and child health in the United States. SRI is working with other top-level world-recognized universities and research institutes to track biological and behavioral development in relation to childhood experiences in more than 11,000 participants as they pass through adolescence and into young adulthood.
Abcdstudy.org
Sleep and Cardiovascular Health in Adolescence
Insomnia in adolescence is common, especially in older adolescence and girls, which poses a threat to their physical and mental health. Insomnia in adolescence is under-recognized, under-diagnosed, under-treated, and reasons for the female preponderance in insomnia are largely unknown. This project, funded by the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute, aims to better understand the pathophysiology of insomnia in adolescence and factors that could contribute to the vulnerability for insomnia, such as female sex. It takes a novel approach to investigate manifestation and implication of physiological hyperarousal in adolescents with DSM-5 Insomnia Disorder using experimental manipulations of the pre-sleep arousal state via stress-induced and relaxation-driven up- and down-regulation of the autonomic system.
Sleep and Memory
This project aims to determine lifespan developmental mechanisms of sex and sex hormone impact on memory in young and midlife women and men. It uses a novel sleep-boosting intervention to further understand the potential protective role of sleep against cognitive decline. Knowledge gained from this proposal could lead to the development of unique non-invasive, sleep-focused interventions to slow cognitive decline and ultimately progression to Alzheimer’s disease in aging women. This project, sponsored by the National Institute on Aging (NIA) is being completed in collaboration with Sara Mednick at University of California, Irvine.
Commercial projects
The SRI Human Sleep Lab has experience and expertise in sleep technology development and testing. Our sophisticated facility is equipped with state-of-the-art lab equipment capable of collecting a broad range of psychophysiological data in healthy sleepers and pathological sleep conditions. We have access to an onsite institutional review board (IRB) and have experience in developing protocols for R&D projects as well as clinical trials. We have worked with various commercial clients to validate, develop and test investigational devices within the sleep technology space.
In addition, our team has unique capability in testing the performance of novel sleep-tracking technologies –e.g., wearable sleep trackers such as smart multi-sensors wristbands– to assess sleep and other physiological signals against gold standard lab polysomnography, research and clinical-grade equipment.
Featured reports and publications
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Human Sleep
Bedtime screen use behaviors and sleep outcomes: Findings from the Adolescent Brain Cognitive Development (ABCD) Study
We aim to determine associations between bedtime screen time behaviors and sleep outcomes in a national study of early adolescents.
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Human Sleep
Effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on screen time and sleep in early adolescents
This study examined changes in sleep habits and recreational screen time (social media, video gaming), and their relationship, before and across the first year of the pandemic in adolescents in the Adolescent Brain Cognitive Development (ABCD) Study.
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Human Sleep
Good Sleep is a Mood Buffer for Young Women During Menses
We sought to elucidate the interaction between sleep and mood considering menstrual cycle phase in 72 healthy young women with natural, regular menstrual cycles and without menstrual-associated disorders.
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Human Sleep
Morning perception of sleep, stress, and mood, and its relationship with overnight physiological sleep: findings from the National Consortium on Alcohol and Neurodevelopment in Adolescence (NCANDA) study
This cross-sectional study investigated objective–subjective sleep discrepancies and the physiological basis for morning perceptions of sleep, mood, and readiness, in adolescents.
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Human Sleep
Stress, hypothalamic pituitary adrenal axis activity and autonomic nervous system function in adolescents with insomnia
We investigated the relationship between insomnia, stress, hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis activity, and autonomic nervous system (ANS) function in adolescence.
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Human Sleep
Call to action: an open-source pipeline for standardized performance evaluation of sleep-tracking technology
There is an urgent need for standardized, rigorous, and open-source tools that the community can access in a timely manner to systematically evaluate the performance of new technology for measuring sleep.
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Human Sleep
Adolescent alcohol use is linked to disruptions in age-appropriate cortical thinning: an unsupervised machine learning approach
In this study, adolescents from the NCANDA study who endorsed little to no alcohol use at baseline were assessed with structural magnetic resonance imaging and followed longitudinally at four yearly intervals.
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Human Sleep
Wearable and mobile technology to characterize daily patterns of sleep, stress, presleep worry, and mood in adolescent insomnia
There is a bidirectional relationship between daily stress and sleep, with daily stress negatively impacting sleep, which in turn leads to more stress in adolescents with and without insomnia symptoms.
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Human Sleep
The role of ovarian hormones in the pathophysiology of perimenopausal sleep disturbances: A systematic review
We reviewed the literature about the influence of ovarian hormones on sleep in perimenopausal women, summarize the potential underlying pathophysiology of menopausal sleep disturbances and evaluate the implications of these findings for the therapeutic approach to sleep disturbances in the context of menopause.