Application of cell phone can help create the perfect dream?

TORONTO (Reuters) - A team of researchers is testing a new iPhone application, in a massive experiment to see if you can create the perfect dream, be it a walk on the beach, a quiet garden to sit or take a ferry trip space.

The implementation Dream: ON, developed by British psychologistRichard Wiseman , a professor at the University of Hertfordshire in England , playing sounds to evoke the feeling of being in a specific environment during the rest of which dreams occur.

"If birds are singing, then the idea is that you'll hear birds singing in your sleep," said Wiseman .

There are 20 different sounds, with songs like Wild West, Space Shuttle or a trip to Tokyo. After choosing an alarm time and sound, the user places the iPhone face down on the mattress and the application records the movements of the body during the night.

During the last 20 minutes of sleep, the application plays the selected sound if the sleeper is in REM sleep, a state in which body movements are suppressed and are more likely to occur dreams.

The application triggers the alarm when the user is coming out of REM sleep because there is only a window of 10 seconds in a dream is remembered, according to Wiseman.

"Ten seconds later and gone," he said, adding that dreams are likely to occur within 20 minutes before awakening.

After inviting users to submit their dream into a database, which will be discussed by Wiseman and his team.

Researchers also are studying whether they can help induce lucid dreaming , a state in which one is aware that he is dreaming and attempts to control sleep.

"Some of our sounds have a voice that tells you what you're dreaming and you're well you control the dream. And one of the questions we ask is, 'induce lucid dreams?,'" Wiseman said.

According to Allan Hobson, a sleep researcher and professor emeritus of psychiatry at Harvard University, lucid dreams are rare.

"There is no doubt that you can influence the plot of your dreams. But lucid dreaming is rare because it is a design error should not happen," said Hobson. "The body does not want to be asleep and awake at the same time, the brain wants to be in a state or in another," he said.

Wiseman had the idea of ​​Dream: ON investigating the relationship between sleep and external stimuli.

"The mood you are in the morning is related to the last dream before waking you. You put people in a good mood and are more happy and productive," he said, noting that it hoped that the application can be used to help people with depression.

Since its launch last week at the International Science Festival in Edinburgh, the application has been downloaded 300,000 times, and has collected data from about 200,000 dreams.