title: Urinary melatonin: a noninvasive method to follow human pineal function as studied in three experimental conditions.
abstract: The aim of this study was to examine whether urinary melatonin, rather than urinary 6-sulfatoxymelatonin (aMT6s), can be used as an indicator of diurnally and seasonally changing melatonin secretion. The subjects (n=15) spent three separate 24-hr periods in a climatic chamber during winter (n=7) and summer (n=8). Blood and urine samples were obtained during each period at 2- to 5-hr intervals. Serum melatonin and urinary melatonin and aMT6s were assayed by radioimmunoassay. The serum melatonin levels increased nearly 10-fold from low daytime to high nocturnal values. The mean nocturnal increase of urinary melatonin was 1.7-fold and that of urinary aMT6s was 4.6-fold. Both urinary melatonin and aMT6s correlated significantly with area under the curve melatonin in serum during the night, during the day and throughout the entire 24-hr observation period in all cases. The ratio between urinary melatonin and aMT6s excretion showed significant diurnal variation, being ninefold higher at 16:00 hr than at 07:00 or at 09:00 hr. The ninefold decrease in the urinary melatonin/aMT6s excretion ratio between the evening and the morning may reflect increased liver metabolism of melatonin during the night. Both urinary melatonin and aMT6s are good indicators of melatonin secretion, but the variation is significantly smaller for the former molecule.
authors.affiliation: Department of Physiology, University of Oulu, Oulu, Finland. tiina.paakkonen@oulu.fi
authors.forename: Tiina
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Pääkkönen
authors.forename: Tiina M
authors.initials: TM
authors.lastname: Mäkinen
authors.forename: Juhani
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Leppäluoto
authors.forename: Olli
authors.initials: O
authors.lastname: Vakkuri
authors.forename: Hannu
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Rintamäki
authors.forename: Lawrence A
authors.initials: LA
authors.lastname: Palinkas
authors.forename: Juhani
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Hassi
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D019540:Area Under Curve; D002940:Circadian Rhythm / Q000502:physiology*; D006801:Humans; D008027:Light; D008297:Male; D008550:Melatonin / Q000031:analogs & derivatives / Q000097:blood / Q000378:metabolism / Q000652:urine*; D008991:Monitoring, Physiologic / Q000379:methods; D010870:Pineal Gland / Q000378:metabolism*; D012621:Seasons; D013696:Temperature
chemical_list: C054513:6-sulfatoxymelatonin; D008550:Melatonin