Sleep could help fight against infection: study

Sleep could enhance the target ability of immune cells inside human body to help fight off infection, a recent study said.

"This finding shows that sleep has the potential to enhance the efficiency of effector T cell responses," according to the report.

Researchers said that compared with the wake condition, sleep significantly increased the mean fluorescence intensity of T cells, a type of white blood cell that fights off infection inside human body.

"Our results demonstrate that a couple of hours of sleep loss suffice to reduce the adhesion capacity of antigen-specific T cells," according to the study published Tuesday in the Journal of Experimental Medicine.

The findings could help develop new therapeutic strategies with the aim of improving the target ability of T cells, especially when they are killing tumor cells.