![](https://i.irp.nih.gov/pi/0010054436.jpg)
Research Topics
The Section on Neuroendocrinology studies the pineal gland and regulation of the pineal hormone melatonin. The work has broad implications for vertebrate biology and is of special interest to clinical scientists studying human diseases relating to circadian rhythms, including endocrine pathologies, sleep and mood disorders, and deficiencies in alertness. The Section also addresses the factors that control the remarkable global changes in gene expression occurring in the pineal gland on a 24-hour basis as well as factors associated with the establishment of the pineal phenotype. Interests range from small and large non-coding RNAs to mRNAs. The Section is dedicated to advancing understand of pineal function through the use of high-throughput sequencing to examine the pineal transcriptome. Moreover, the Section is involved in efforts to apply such methods to other systems to better understand the molecular basis of biological regulation.
Biography
Selected Publications
- Klein DC. Arylalkylamine N-acetyltransferase: "the Timezyme". J Biol Chem. 2007;282(7):4233-7.
- Falcón J, Coon SL, Besseau L, Cazaméa-Catalan D, Fuentès M, Magnanou E, Paulin CH, Boeuf G, Sauzet S, Jørgensen EH, Mazan S, Wolf YI, Koonin EV, Steinbach PJ, Hyodo S, Klein DC. Drastic neofunctionalization associated with evolution of the timezyme AANAT 500 Mya. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2014;111(1):314-9.
- Coon SL, Munson PJ, Cherukuri PF, Sugden D, Rath MF, Møller M, Clokie SJ, Fu C, Olanich ME, Rangel Z, Werner T, NISC Comparative Sequencing Program, Mullikin JC, Klein DC. Circadian changes in long noncoding RNAs in the pineal gland. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2012;109(33):13319-24.
- Klein DC. Evolution of the vertebrate pineal gland: the AANAT hypothesis. Chronobiol Int. 2006;23(1-2):5-20.
Related Scientific Focus Areas
This page was last updated on Tuesday, October 18, 2011