![]() These people can adjust more easily to changes in dozing schedules. About half of the population falls in the middle - neither a morning nor an evening type, Brown said. Natural variances in the circadian rhythm account for sleep session biases. Early birds were more often found to have a longer version of the gene than night owls. Back in 2003, researchers discovered a major player, called the Period 3 or "clock" gene. The interplay of a myriad of genes controls one's circadian rhythm. "The circadian pacemaker has multiple projections in the brain affecting endocrine cycles, hormonal cycles - pretty much everything about your body," said Donna Arand, clinical director of the Kettering Sleep Disorders Center in Dayton, Ohio. The control center for the circadian rhythm involves two groups of nerve cells, called the suprachiasmatic nuclei (SCN), located in the mid-brain behind our eyes. ![]() Secretions of the hormone melatonin also crest during the night, for instance. In human circadian rhythms, body temperature varies over the course of a day, usually peaking in the afternoon and bottoming out in the early morning. This 24-hour cycle of waxing and waning biological processes is found in almost all forms of life. The underlying mechanism for our patterns of shut-eye is called a circadian rhythm. "If you're a morning-type person, you can't become an evening type, and vice versa," said Brown. But for those of us squarely in one chronotype camp or the other, in the end, the body is the boss. ![]() To a certain extent, behavior and environment - say, routinely pumping iron in a well-lit gym toward midnight - can shift our built-in predispositions. ![]()
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