NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - Mutations in Clock, a primary circadian gene, are associated with obesity and metabolic syndrome in mice, according to a report in the April 21st online issue of Science.
“This provides new genetic evidence that physiologic outputs of the biological clock, sleep and appetite are interconnected at the molecular and behavioral levels, yielding implications on the role of internal biological timing in optimizing strategies to reduce and sustain weight loss resulting from both medical and lifestyle modification,” lead author Dr. Fred W. Turek, from Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois, said in a statement.
In the study, Dr. Turk’s team found that homozygous Clock mutant mice have several feeding and metabolic disturbance. The normal diurnal feeding rhythm is greatly reduced in these animals and they also display hyperphagia and obesity. The metabolic abnormalities included hyperleptinemia, hyperlipidemia, hepatic steatosis, hyperglycemia, and hypoinsulinemia.
Further analysis showed that the expression of brain peptides involved in energy balance was reduced in Clock mutant mice, the investigators point out.
The current findings emphasize “how critical normal diurnal timekeeping is, from molecular to behavioral levels, for the health and well being of the organism,” the authors conclude.
Science 2005
MeSH Headings:Nutritional and Metabolic Diseases: DiseasesCopyright © 2002 Reuters Limited. All rights reserved. Republication or redistribution of Reuters content, including by framing or similar means, is expressly prohibited without the prior written consent of Reuters. Reuters shall not be liable for any errors or delays in the content, or for any actions taken in reliance thereon. Reuters and the Reuters sphere logo are registered trademarks and trademarks of the Reuters group of companies around the world.
