We are really not equal when it comes to sleep. Some need a lot of sleep while others can be content with short nights, others take hours to fall asleep... And then there are the "night owls", those people who cannot manage to go to bed at a reasonable hour (watch Netflix or play the console until 2 a.m., do you like that?). In itself, this is not necessarily very annoying, except that they have to get up at the same time as the others to go to work. It's hard not to be super tired... Researchers have just discovered that not being able to go to bed early is due to a genetic mutation.
Researchers at Rockefeller University have discovered that a variation in the CRY1 gene results in a slowing down of the biological clock (also called the circadian clock), which tells us when to go to bed and when it's time to get up. get up. Thus, in “night owls”, this cycle is longer, which explains why they do not feel tired until late at night. The author of the study published in the journal Cell estimates that the mutation could be present in 1 in 75 people in certain populations. In a “normal” circadian cycle, genes are activated at certain times and inactive at others. It is the protein generated by the CRY1 gene that is responsible for “turning them on”. Except that… when CRY1 mutates, its protein is active longer, which explains why melatonin (the sleep hormone) which normally activates around 9 or 10 p.m. is activated in these people around 2 or 3 a.m. in the morning. For the moment, there is little solution for patients suffering from this genetic mutation, except to force themselves to go to bed early and follow a strict schedule or even do light therapy sessions.
Other studies are already planned to verify the impact of the CRY1 gene mutation on hunger and hormones. To be continued…
