Your Biological Clock Can be Measured With a Hair Sample

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Your Biological Clock Can be Measured With a Hair Sample

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Have you ever wondered why jet lag is such a horribly uncomfortable experience? That’s because your body clock doesn’t just regulate your sleep cycle, it affects a whole host of other bodily functions, like hormone levels, metabolism, your immune activity, and more.

This means that when your circadian rhythms are disrupted, it can disrupt various systems. This also means that time of day can be an important factor when considering medical treatment. For example, aortic valve replacements performed in the afternoon are associated with fewer adverse side effects.

Unfortunately, determining the time your internal clock tells you is a little more difficult than glancing at a watch, in part because everyone’s body clock runs at a slightly different pace. Currently, the most accurate test is to repeatedly measure melatonin levels in saliva during the hours before bedtime, which is difficult to do outside of a laboratory or hospital.

Read more: “Immunity is all about timing”

Now, according to new research published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of SciencesChronobiologists have developed a way to get an accurate reading of your body clock from a simple hair sample. By measuring the transcriptional activity of clock genes in hair follicle cells and performing analysis using artificial intelligence, they were able to accurately determine the time of the biological clock.

“In these cells, we measure the activity of 17 genes that are part of or controlled by the molecular clock,” study author Achim Kramer of Charité-Universitätsmedizin Berlin explained in a statement. “Thanks to machine learning, this model can be used to calculate at what point in the daily rhythm the person is currently at. A single sample is enough for this.”

Using this test, researchers were able to confirm several findings from other studies, including that people in their 20s get tired on average about an hour later than those over 50, and that women’s internal timers signal a “sleepiness” signal slightly earlier than men’s.

Although this new test will require a little more fine-tuning before being standardized for laboratory use, researchers are optimistic that streamlining the process can open new opportunities for circadian medicine, tailoring treatments to chronotypes that enhance their impact and reduce side effects.

Who knows, maybe one day we’ll find a cure for jet lag.