Premium
Peripheral Circadian Oscillators
Author(s) -
Cuninkova Ludmila,
Brown Steven A.
Publication year - 2008
Publication title -
annals of the new york academy of sciences
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.712
H-Index - 248
eISSN - 1749-6632
pISSN - 0077-8923
DOI - 10.1196/annals.1417.005
Subject(s) - suprachiasmatic nucleus , circadian rhythm , neuroscience , biological clock , bacterial circadian rhythms , biology , light effects on circadian rhythm , chronotype , circadian clock , hypothalamus , peripheral , medicine
The lives of plants, animals, and human beings are all regulated by circadian clocks. In mammals, 24‐hour rhythms of physiology and behavior are directed by a master clock in the suprachiasmatic nucleus (SCN) of the brain hypothalamus, which in turn entrains “slave” oscillators of similar molecular composition in most cells of the body. These peripheral clocks are interesting not only because they control many aspects of circadian physiology, but also because they are model systems through which we understand how the SCN regulates complex behavior. To this end, peripheral oscillators have been exploited both biochemically to understand the proteins that make up biological clocks, and genetically to decipher the ways in which individual differences in human chronotype might arise.