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NEWS ... GLOBAL NEWS ... monitoring system," says Sayler. FROM BODY CLOCKS TO CHRONOTHERAPEUTICS Advanced BBICs could serve as bioter- ] : hronobiology, as the study of body clocks is known, has already produced some rorism monitors, as a means to detect DNA om ‘ curiosities. If you want to bet on when you might give birth naturally, go for radiation damage in astronauts, or as a | between 4 am and 6 am. If you have osteoarthritis, it will hit you worst in the early diagnostic tool for doctors. evening. Your risk of an asthma attack is 300 times higher between 2 am and 6 am. (Source: NASA Headlines, 10 June 2004, Each disease, it seems, strikes hardest at a time of its own choosing. hitp://science.nasa. gov/headlines/y2004/ It took decades of investigation for scientists to tease out the location of the body's 10jun_bbics.htm) master clock. Eventually, in mammals at least, it was narrowed down to a clump of just 20,000 cells in a part of the brain called the suprachiasmatic nuclei (SCN), a part of the A CLOSE CALL WITH ASTEROID hypothalamus at the base of the brain. Within the cells, scientists found a series of TOUTATIS IN SEPTEMBER 2004? genes that switched on, off and back on again over a 24-hour period. This cycle has two O: 29 September, a three-mile-long | knock-on effects: firstly, to send electrical pulses into the nervous system; and asteroid will make the closest predict- | secondly, to produce squirts of hormones. Both spread through the body like the chime ed approach of any asteroid or comet to | of aclock. visit Earth in the next 30 years, say scien- Scientists have since discovered that while the SCN beats out a standard time for the tists at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory | body, each of our organs uses the signal to set its own individual clock, much as coun- Near-Earth Orbiting Programme Office. _| tries set their time by GMT. Many organs, such as the liver and kidneys, are typically They predict the asteroid will come within | on New York time—five hours behind our master body clock. 963,000 miles of Earth—a very near miss. Many working at the forefront of chronobiology believe that medicine has missed a Asteroid 4179 Toutatis was named after _| trick by failing to take time variations into account. "Look at how we educate doctors a Celtic/Gallic god, and is one of the and scientists. They're taught that the body is in a constant state over 24 hours, not that largest known Potentially Hazardous you get these cycles," says Michael Smolensky, an expert in body clocks at the Asteroids (PHAs) that approaches our _ | University of Texas at Houston. planet on a Near Earth Orbit (NEO). The upshot is that many in the medical profession, though aware that physiology Close encounters with Venus, Earth, | Changes with time, do not appreciate the implications. Many experts in the field are convinced that if doctors and pharmaceutical companies appreciated how diseases vary with time, they could significantly improve their treat- solar system every 3.98 years. On 31 ments. Studies have already shown that, in the case of certain diseases, taking drugs at October 2000, the asteroid passed less than different times has a marked influence on how effective they are. 29 Junar distances from Earth. The 29 The revelation that drugs work better at certain times has raised deep concerns among some in the scientific community who believe that it undermines how common chemical tests are performed. Before a drug gets anywhere near a human, it is tested on animals, usually rodents. And your typical lab mouse is nocturnal. "It means we've been testing chemicals, and not just drugs, on animals whose physiology is 12 hours out of synch with our own," says Foster. "Does this mean we need to redo all of our toxicity testing? It's not out of the question." Foster believes that the pharmaceutical industry could benefit from investigating how time affects the workings of its drugs. Doing so could not only reveal the best time to take a drug, but also when not to take it. "Say you test a new anticancer drug and it causes appalling side-effects and kills lots of animals. You decide you can't use that drug, and move on to another one," Foster says. "But if that drug had been tested at another time, say 12 hours later, it may have caused very few side-effects. So it could well be the case that not only are we giving drugs that cause more damage than neces- Mars and Jupiter constantly alter the shape of the asteroid's path as it loops through the September 2004 fly-past will come within four lunar distances of the Earth. Toutatis also has one of the strangest rotations yet observed in the solar system. Instead of spinning about a single axis, as do the planets and the vast majority of asteroids, it "tumbles" somewhat like a rugby football when it bounces. At three miles long, it would present a terrible danger if it were to collide with the Earth, although scientists at NASA say this is unlikely. It is travelling at a speed of about 20 miles per second, and if it struck an ocean it would unleash a "mega tsunami" | sary, but we are missing out on other very valuable drugs because they are nasty at the or giant tidal wave that could reach around _| time they are tested.” the entire globe, inundating millions of Despite emphasising the shortcomings, though, Redfern doesn't rule out chronothera- hectares of land, destroying coastal | peutics. "There may well be conditions like cancer, asthma, cardiovascular disease and habitations and killing perhaps millions of _ | epilepsy where this is worth looking at,” he says. people. "It's not like 10 years ago, when this was considered a bit off-the-wall. It's taken a lot If it hit land, it could annihilate an area _| more seriously now. We know it isn't fantasy." the size of Europe and raise enough dust . into the atmosphere to change the climate Further reading of the planet, causing a mini ice age that _ | * Rhythms of Life, by Russell Foster and Leon Kreitzman, Profile Books, 2004, ISBN would freeze crops, destroy plant life and 1861972350 pre-empt a global famine. * Chronotherapeutics, by Peter Redfern, Pharmaceutical Press, 2003, ISBN 0853694885 An orbit simulation of the close |° /e Body Clock Guide to Better Health, by Michael Smolensky and Lynne Lamberg, approach of Toutatis is at http://neo.jpl. Owl Books, 2001, ISBN 0805056629 . . nasa.gov/cgi-bin/db?name=4179. * Chronobiology, by Jay C. Dunlap et al., Sinauer Associates, 2003, ISBN 087893149X (Source: Ian Gurney, 5 February 2004) (Source: by lan Sample, The Guardian, UK, I July 2004) NEXUS +9 AUGUST — SEPTEMBER 2004 www.nexusmagazine.com