Melatonin The Master Molecule

To optimize melatonin or not to optimize melatonin? What is it? How do we optimize it? And what are its effects on the body?

In my previous article “Blue Light Destroying Your Health?” we briefly went over cortisol, melatonin’s antagonist hormone. I explained how constant exposure to blue light led to adverse measures of cortisol within the body. Chronically elevated cortisol can create an array of issues including: high blood glucose levels, suppressed immune system, inflated inflammatory markers, increased stress and a broken sleep cycle. We also found that blue light, when isolated in modern screens and light bulbs, can create reactive oxygen species (ROS), potentially harming cell function. Ending the article, I alluded to cortisol and melatonin having opposing goals within the body. What you will learn after reading this article is that cortisol and melatonin have an almost ying/yang balance, and when optimized, work in unison for the body. I will also explain why having a proper and natural light environment is key to optimizing this ratio. So, what is this hormone called melatonin?

The basics of melatonin

The “hormone of darkness”, while this nickname is often associated with melatonin, it can be a bit misleading. Understandably, melatonin is secreted at nighttime when darkness is present, yet it is actually daylight that is responsible for the production of the hormone, specifically light from the near infrared spectrum. Near infrared at its peak, although always present in sunlight, is associated with the red/orange color that we see in sunrise, sunset, and fire. It just so happens that God had the three most prevalent sources if NIR light perfectly timed for our circadian rhythm. From the moment we view sunrise our body starts building back its melatonin stores in order to utilize them later that night in sleep, then as the sun begins to set, we receive yet another, more focused, bout of NIR light.

This concept, of NIR light stimulating melatonin serum levels, was found true in a Chinese study aiming to find how NIR light, from a red light table, affected melatonin levels. It concluded that “participants in the red-light treatment group (38.8 ± 6.7 pg/mL) demonstrated greater improvement in serum melatonin level than the placebo group (23.8 ± 7.3 pg/mL)”. This communicates the value of having a healthy and properly timed light environment. A sufficient light environment for everyday life is crucial for melatonin production and overall cell health.

In a normal day our mitochondria conduct an astounding measure of reactions, particularly coming from the electron chain transport. Mitochondria generate ATP, create reactive oxygen species, helping to modulate the immune system, create water, vital for the synthesis of every hormone in your body, control the life cycle of the cells they live in (called apoptosis), and many more functions. There is a lot of astounding events going on within these cell organelles, after all, they run your cells, which therefore run the body, so optimizing them is a pretty important goal.

One of the leading researchers in mitochondrial health is Doctor Doug Wallace, from Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, whom attributes the vast majority of modern diseases to poor mitochondria health, NOT NUCLEAR DNA (the DNA the resides in the nucleus of the cell, also the most attributed to illnesses). In one research paper Dr Wallace hypothesized “that mitochondrial dysfunction plays a central role in a wide range of age-related disorders and various forms of cancer”, as he has often been attributed with saying 80-90% of diseases are mitochondrial based. When the worlds leading researcher on mitochondrial health is making a claim like that, it may be worth your attention. Yet, our modern world makes it quite difficult to care for our mitochondria, especially when we a lot of us are full of cortisol around the clock and lack abundant stores of melatonin that aide in repairing the mitochondria.

Worn Out Mitochondria

Imagine there was a green light that followed you around all day that turned on and off. While on, it meant you had to perform some capacity of work, but while off, it meant you could rest and repair. Now envision that light rarely turning off. Your work would slowly become less efficient and you would be worn out, you might even just give up and shut down. Apply this analogy to your body, the green light being daylight, signaling for the secretion of cortisol. Our mitochondria are then laden with producing enough energy to keep us awake, cycling from synthesizing ATP to then recycling ATP over and over again. As mentioned, this process is also attributed with the generation of reactive oxygen species. Normally this is where melatonin plays a massive role, yet again, if our lifestyle isn’t optimized for melatonin production this becomes an issue.

One can easily gauge the relationship between melatonin and sleep just from looking at the above chart. If melatonin is most prevalent in our sleep cycle and sleep is responsible for repair, then wouldn’t melatonin be one of the driving forces behind that repair? This goes back to oxidative stress, when oxidative stress becomes unchecked, our bodies begin collecting these free radicals, in turn causing high levels of untamed inflammation.

Although, if melatonin production is operating as normal, this process is controlled. A scientific review on melatonin noted that “melatonin is remarkably functionally diverse with actions as a free radical scavenger and antioxidant, circadian rhythm regulator, anti-inflammatory and immunoregulating molecule, and as an oncostatic agent”, yet not only are its capabilities as a free radical scavenger astonishing, but also is responsible for modulating “a large number of antioxidative and pro-oxidative enzymes”. This displays the amazing capabilities of melatonin in regulating uninhibited, inflammation causing, free radicals. Melatonin is truly the master trash man!

Have a look at this chart to get a better idea of what that means:

ATP Production

So why is melatonin’s role in scavenging these free radicals so important, specifically for exceptional ATP production? ATP is a byproduct of the electron chain transport: the process of shuttling electrons from protein complex to protein complex, generating energy along the way within the mitochondria. When this process is overrun with free radicals it puts a massive burden on how much ATP our mitochondria can produce. When ATP production is hindered, mitochondria function goes downhill, leading to even greater amount of free radicals. As one research paper put it, it is “a vicious cycle thus results under these conditions of oxidative stress with the final consequence being cell death by necrosis or apoptosis”. Basically, if the stress of excessive free radicals wasn’t so much that it causes outright death, it was enough to cause irreversible damage that ultimately will lead to death.

A great analogy one of the leading experts on melatonin, Dr John Lieurance, often uses is: “when you are tired, and don’t have the energy clean your room up, and that mess will continue collecting, but as soon as you get that boost in energy, your ready to tackle that mess and put things back in order”. Your mitochondria are the same way when they are bogged down, stuff that needs to get done starts mounting, but as soon as melatonin does its job, ATP production kicks back online and all that stress is liberated. This is why the mitochondria make melatonin, melatonin is its own buffer against this chaos and immense stress. With that picture in mind its easy to see how deficient energy production, due to low melatonin levels, can be a cause of some pretty nasty things.

Disease And Melatonin

Referring back to Dr Wallace, who believes poor mitochondria health is responsible for much of the cancers we see, cancer cells are always being formed, though these cells are usually disposed of as soon as our body is made aware. If ATP production is low, our immune cells and every cell that defends the body against cancer, have less “gas” to run on. Eventually, the cancer cells mount to a devastating threshold, leaving us diseased and ill.

While melatonin allows our healthy cells to have high levels of ATP production, in cancer cells it has been established to have an affect on “mitochondrial function by decreasing ATP production, activating the reactive oxygen species (ROS) to promote apoptosis in cancer cells, and inhibiting telomerase activity”. In human terms, melatonin lowers cancer cell’s ATP generating ability, activates a free radical cascade to induce cell death, while also shortening the cell’s lifespan and ability to spread via the inhibiting of telomerase length!

Which leads me to DNA and melatonin. When DNA is damaged, certain genes are turned “on” and “off”, also referred to as gene expression. When DNA sparred from excessive free radical damage, these genes don’t get a chance to express themselves, thus preventing the issue before it comes about. Melatonin plays a fascinating role here, in that, melatonin’s has the ability to activate DNA repair pathways, with one study finding that “its scavenging effect and stimulation of DNA repair pathways were significantly reported”.

How many people in our modern world blame genetics for their health issues? Most doctors don’t even go beyond the question of family health history, if your dad had cancer or autoimmune so will you! While DNA plays a role, it is not a determining factor for your future or current health. Our bodies, through our own endogenous hormones, can repair these damaged pathways and silence these harmful genes. It is evident melatonin is important for illness and plays a diverse role in helping the body heal and revitalize. Without adequate melatonin we cannot expect to overcome disease, for something so simple to fix it seems like a no brainer.

Conclusion

Melatonin is the bodies MOST powerful tool in fighting off oxidative stress, it scavenges free radicals, stimulates other endogenous anti oxidative enzymes, boosts ATP production, protects and aids in the repair of DNA, fights cancer cells and a whole lot more that we didn’t cover. Melatonin is beyond helping one achieve sleep, its wide variety of mechanisms help the body rehabilitate from daily stressors. Getting sufficient near infrared light from the sun can have a dramatic impact on internal production. Keeping cortisol levels in check and reducing man made blue light exposure, particularly at night, will aid in maintaining a proper cortisol/melatonin balance. Melatonin is needed to keep our bodies engines, the mitochondria, healthy and running at high RPMS. With high functioning mitochondria, our bodies thrive off of plentiful amounts of energy, reducing the chances of illness. In conclusion, we need melatonin now more than ever, so do everything you can to boost those levels!

Helpful Tips

Although I would love to cover every helpful factor that goes into boosting melatonin levels, I try and keep these newsletters short and to the point, however here are some things I practice for optimized melatonin levels:

• See sunrise and sunset every morning and evening even if cloudy, 5-10 min works great

• Get healthy amounts of sun throughout the day

• Use a lower kelvin light bulb at night (talked about here) and wear blue light glasses

• Balance stress levels around bedtime, preferably via meditation or prayer around bed in a darker room

• Utilize red light therapy devices in morning and evening

• And basic lifestyle hacks like healthy whole foods diet and exercise

• Dr John Lieurance is an amazing resource on utilizing exogenous melatonin for ill individuals, you can find him on youtube and Spotify as he has numerous interviews (yes it is an ok practice but start with the basics first!!)

Cites

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3499892/ (melatonin produced by NIR)

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/26272235/ (melatonin in mito)

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1357272501001388 (mela and atp)

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2821041/ (doug wallace)

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/15183071/

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8123278/