The coordination of developmental and physiological events with environmental signals is facilitated by the action of the circadian clock. Here we report a new set of circadian clock-controlled phenotypes for Arabidopsis thaliana. We use these markers together with the short-period mutant, toc1-1, and the clock-controlled cab2::luciferase reporter gene to assess the nature of the circadian cloc...

There are conflicting reports regarding circadian variation in the onset of acute myocardial infarction (MI) among patients with diabetes. We therefore, studied the circadian pattern of the incidence of acute MI in patients (n = 3,882) who were enrolled in the Onset Study stratified by the presence, type, and duration of diabetes. The Onset Study was conducted at 64 U.S. medical centers between...

Two newly isolated mutant strains of Neurospora crassa, cpz-1 and cpz-2, were hypersensitive to chlorpromazine with respect to mycelial growth but responded differently to the drug with respect to the circadian conidiation rhythm. In the wild type, chlorpromazine caused shortening of the period length of the conidiation rhythm. Pulse treatment with the drug shifted the phase and inhibited light...

The maternal care that offspring receive from their mothers early in life influences the offspring's development of emotional behavior in adulthood. Here we found that offspring reared by circadian clock-impaired mice show elevated anxiety-related behavior. Clock mutant mice harboring a mutation in Clock, a key component of the molecular circadian clock, display altered daily patterns of nursin...

Transgenic flies carrying a 7.2 kb piece of DNA from the period (per) gene were analyzed for the presence of circadian locomotor activity rhythms and fluctuations of per-encoded mRNA and protein. The 5' end of this genomic fragment is within the first intron, which precedes the coding region. This promotorless fragment could rescue circadian behavioral rhythms and mediate spatial expression of ...

While progress has been made in determining the molecular basis for the circadian clock, the mechanism by which mammalian brains time intervals measured in seconds to minutes remains a mystery. An obvious question is whether the interval-timing mechanism shares molecular machinery with the circadian timing mechanism. In the current study, we trained circadian CLOCK +/- and -/- mutant male mice ...

OBJECTIVE The link between alterations in circadian rhythms and depression are well established, but the underlying mechanisms are far less elucidated. We investigated the circadian characteristics of immobility behavior in wild type (WT) mice and mice with mutations in core Clock genes. METHODS All mice were tested with forced swim test (FST) at 4 h intervals. RESULTS These experiments rev...

The expression of CHALCONE SYNTHASE (CHS) expression is an important control step in the biosynthesis of flavonoids, which are major photoprotectants in plants. CHS transcription is regulated by endogenous programs and in response to environmental signals. Luciferase reporter gene fusions showed that the CHS promoter is controlled by the circadian clock both in roots and in aerial organs of tra...

This month's installment of Generally Physiological focuses on mitochondria, exploring circadian regulation of mitochondrial oxidative metabolism, what happens when you eliminate the mitochondrial calcium uniporter, and Ca 2+ transport by the inner mito-chondrial membrane protein Letm1. Circadian regulation of mitochondrial bioenergetics Circadian clocks synchronize physiological processes with...