Metabolic regulation of circadian clocks

Abstract

Circadian clocks are 24-h timekeeping mechanisms, which have evolved in plants, animals, fungi and bacteria to anticipate changes in light and temperature associated with the rotation of the Earth. The current paradigm to explain how biological clocks provide timing information is based on multiple interlocking transcription-translation negative feedback loops (TTFL), which drive rhythmic gene expression and circadian behaviour of growth and physiology. Metabolism is an important circadian output, which in plants includes photosynthesis, starch metabolism, nutrient assimilation and redox homeostasis. There is increasing evidence in a range of organisms that these metabolic outputs can also c..