Molecular components of the mammalian circadian clock

Circadian rhythms are approximately 24-h oscillations in behavior and physiology, which are internally generated and function to anticipate the environmental changes associated with the solar day. A conserved transcriptional-translational autoregulatory loop generates molecular oscillations of 'clock genes' at the cellular level. In mammals, the circadian system is organized in a hierarchical manner, in which a master pacemaker in the suprachiasmatic nucleus (SCN) regulates downstream oscillators in peripheral tissues. Recent findings have revealed that the clock is cell-autonomous and self-sustained not only in a central pacemaker, the SCN, but also in peripheral tissues and in dissociated cultured cells. It…