Effects of Nutrition and Sleep on Sports Performance in Young Adults
A Special Issue of Nutrients (ISSN 2072-6643) belonging to the section "Sports Nutrition".
Deadline for manuscript submissions: 25 February 2027 | Viewed by 362
Editor
Interests: nutrition and exercise interventions; athletic performance; sports nutrition; quality of life; recovery; heart rate variability; sleep architecture; athlete; athlete readiness; dietary supplements; supplements; sleep onset; sleep quality; sleep latency; injury; ergogenic aids
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Special Issue Information
Dear Colleagues,
Optimal sports performance in young adults is underpinned by the dynamic and interdependent roles of nutrition and sleep, two modifiable behaviors that exert profound influences on physiological adaptation, recovery, and long-term athlete development. Young adulthood represents a critical transitional period characterized by high training demands, academic and occupational stressors, and irregular lifestyle patterns that can compromise dietary quality and sleep duration. Emerging evidence indicates that inadequate energy intake, suboptimal macronutrient distribution, micronutrient insufficiencies, and poor hydration practices can impair training adaptations, immune function, and injury resilience. Concurrently, insufficient or poor-quality sleep disrupts endocrine regulation, autonomic balance, and neurocognitive function, with downstream consequences for recovery, decision-making, and performance consistency.
Importantly, nutrition and sleep do not operate in isolation. Dietary behaviors influence sleep architecture and circadian alignment, while sleep loss alters appetite regulation, food choice, and metabolic efficiency. These bidirectional interactions are particularly relevant for young adults engaged in competitive sport, where marginal deficits may accumulate to meaningfully impair performance outcomes. Despite growing interest, the literature remains fragmented, with limited integrative research examining how nutrition and sleep jointly influence sport-specific performance, recovery, and health in this population.
This Special Issue aims to synthesize current evidence, highlight mechanistic pathways, and identify critical gaps in knowledge related to nutrition–sleep interactions and athletic performance in young adults. Collectively, these contributions are intended to inform evidence-based strategies for practitioners, coaches, and researchers seeking to optimize performance and well-being in this population.
Dr. Andrew Jagim
Guest Editor
Manuscript Submission Information
Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 250 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for assessment.
Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-anonymized peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Nutrients is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.
Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2900 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.
Keywords
- nutrition
- dietary supplements
- nutrients
- energy
- sleep
- sleep duration
- sleep quality
- recovery
- performance
- athlete
- readiness
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