McEachron D L, Kripke D F, Wyborney V G
Psychiatry Res. 1981 Aug;5(1):1-9. doi: 10.1016/0165-1781(81)90055-x.
Manic-depressive patients may have an endogenous circadian oscillator (about 24-hour clock) which runs too fast or which seeks too advanced or early a phase. Lithium salts are a major treatment for manic-depressives and may work by slowing this overly fast clock. Previous experiments with blinded rats demonstrated that lithium could delay free-running circadian rhythms. In this experiment, male rats were exposed to 27- and 28-hour light-dark cycles which were too long to synchronize the rhythms of control animals. In these control animals, the interaction of a faster (about 24-hour) internal rhythm with a slower light-dark cycle produced a beating interaction. cyclic variations in activity were observed as a result. Measurement of wheel-running activity indicated that its circadian rhythm was significantly slowed in lithium-fed animals and became synchronized with the light-dark cycle. This illustrates and supports the hypothesis that an action of lithium may be to delay and resynchronize overly fast circadian rhythms.
躁郁症患者可能有一个内源性昼夜节律振荡器（约24小时生物钟），其运行速度过快，或者寻求过于超前或过早的相位。锂盐是治疗躁郁症的主要药物，其作用可能是减缓这个过快的生物钟。之前对失明大鼠的实验表明，锂可以延迟自由运行的昼夜节律。在本实验中，雄性大鼠暴露于27小时和28小时的明暗周期中，这对于对照动物的节律同步来说太长了。在这些对照动物中，较快的（约24小时）内部节律与较慢的明暗周期相互作用产生了一种跳动相互作用。结果观察到活动的周期性变化。对轮转活动的测量表明，喂食锂的动物其昼夜节律明显减缓，并与明暗周期同步。这说明了并支持了这样一个假说，即锂的作用可能是延迟并重新同步过快的昼夜节律。
