Steve Brown's legacy: Tools to study the individual human molecular circadian clock and its regulation

Since the discovery of the genetic origin of the circadian clock in Drosophila melanogaster by Konopka and Benzer in 1971, most of the research about the regulation of the molecular circadian clock relies on laboratory models. Additional models such as Cyanobacteria, Neurospora crassa, Arabidopsis and rodents helped chronobiologists to describe the species-specific molecular clocks and their regulation. However, the lack of tools and the difficulty to access biological samples somehow excluded human from this research landscape outside behavioural research. Among many other impressive achievements, Steve Brown provided to the community of chronobiologists new tools and strategies to study the individual human circadian clock and its regulation. Steve Brown research contributed to the development of new tools allowing the study of individual circadian clock in human. His research demonstrated the role of post-translational regulations and circulating factors in the regulation of the phase and period of the human clock. image