By Kim Tae-gyu
Staff Reporter


South Korean scientists have discovered a gene causing sleep disturbances, opening the door for developing a breakthrough therapy for controlling human sleep.

Shin Hee-sup, a senior researcher of the Korea Institute of Science and Technology (KIST), on Sunday said his team had found the T-type calcium channel, a pacemaker for brain rhythms during sleep, is involved in various sleep disorders.

``We believe various sleep-related disorders like night terror, which typically occur in children, and sleep-walking are also triggered by a lack of T-type calcium,’’ Shin said.

Shin’s team genetically engineered mice lacking in the T-type calcium channel and found by examining their brain waves that the mutant mice were unable to sleep soundly.

Compared to normal mice, the genetically altered ones showed a loss of delta waves (1~4Hz), which appear during a deep sleep, and exhibited a higher incidence of brief awakening.

``Through this study, we found a key to understanding the sleeping mechanism of humans. It has huge therapeutic potential,’’ Shin claimed.

The calcium channels are proteins that allow calcium ions to flow into cells. The influx of calcium plays an integral role in many important cell functions.

Various types of calcium channels exist in the brain and they can be classified to the likes of type-L, type-N and type-T, according to their physiological properties. Among them, type-T is associated with neuronal network activity.

Unlike other elements of type-L and type-N, which have been targets of therapeutic examination, knowledge of type-T has been limited.

Until now, scientists have been in two opposing camps with some contending that type-T helps people have a good sleep while others arguing it helps people stay awake.

Shin has been a pioneer in shedding light on the role of T-type calcium channels as his team already found a disturbance of T-type channels is associated with epilepsy in 2001 and 2004.

``Based on our findings, the development of new-concept drugs for sleep disorders and epilepsy is underway by the KIST. We expect the drugs will also have pain-killing effects,’’ Shin said.

Shin’s study was printed in the December edition of Proceedings of the National Academy of Science (PNAS), one of the world’s most-cited scientific serials based in the United States.

voc200@koreatimes.co.kr