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Biological Clock Could Be Re-Set: Study

by Medindia Content Team on Mar 23 2006 7:58 PM

A new study has found that the body clock, which plays a major role in our metal and physical health could be re-set to help people working in swing shifts, experiencing jet lag or facing depression.

Everyone is equipped with a biological clock, a region in the brain of the size of a corn kernel, which dictates our sleep-wake cycles. A research conducted by Kent State professor David Glass has shown that this clock can be re-set, reported science portal EurekAlert.

The body clock is an internal mechanism in organisms that controls the periodicity of various functions or activities, such as metabolic changes, sleep cycles or photosynthesis.

Glass, known internationally as the first researcher to measure serotonin release from the brain's biological clock region, has become the first to extract, identify and measure a neuropeptide, a protein crucial to the regulation of the body's clock.

Glass found that neuropeptide could be used to re-set the biological clock when it has been disrupted.

--Edited IANS


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