Biological clocks are inherent timing mechanisms in living systems that provide the timing or periodicity of various behaviours and physiological states and processes, i.e., the biological clock regulates the timing of biological events, including circadian rhythms, the daily cycles of activity and rest governing sleep-wake cycles.
This rhythm occurs naturally in sync with the Earth’s daily axial spin, at approx. 1,050 mph, which happens while we travel around the Sun at approx. 70,000 mph, leading to alternating darkness and light, and other than for those on the equator, varying seasons and the transitional times in between, no wonder biological entities need internal clocks!
Biological clocks also play a role in hormone production & release, cell regeneration, metabolism, and even mood. The menstrual cycle is regulated by the biological clock, with ovulation occurring at a specific point in the cycle. The orchestrations provided by biological clocks involve tens of trillions of biological cells.
In recent years, in humans, scientists have begun to investigate how the biological clock affects our health and well-being. For example, studies have shown that disruptions to the circadian rhythm can lead to problems such as insomnia, obesity, and depression. Additionally, the biological clock has been implicated in the development of certain types of cancer.
Research has shown that our cells contain ‘clock’ genes, which help to regulate the timing of cell division. These genes are believed to be critical for maintaining the health of our tissues and organs over the course of our lives. In addition, our bodies also appear to be programmed for aging, with declines in function starting at around the age of thirty. While we can’t currently stop the aging process, understanding how it works may help us to find ways to slow it down, or gasp! one day even to reverse it!
Regulating the metabolism
The human body is a complex biological ‘machine’ that is constantly breaking down and rebuilding itself. This process, known as metabolism, is essential for maintaining good health. Metabolism is the sum of all the chemical reactions that occur in the body. These reactions help to convert food into energy, repair damaged cells, and remove waste products. Metabolism also plays a role in regulating body temperature and blood pressure.
A variety of factors can influence metabolism, including age, weight, diet, and activity level.
The biological clock regulates the body's metabolism by controlling the production of enzymes, hormones, and other substances that are involved in metabolic processes. Enzymes are proteins that catalyse chemical reactions in the body, and hormones are chemical messengers that regulate various bodily functions.
Proteins are large biomolecules and macromolecules comprising one or more long chains of amino acid residues. Proteins perform a vast array of functions within organisms, including catalysing metabolic reactions, DNA replication, responding to stimuli, providing structure to cells and organisms, and transporting molecules from one location to another.
Biological clocks can be reset by exposure to light, by photostimulation, or darkness, by entrainment. When the biological clock is out of sync with the body's natural rhythms, it can lead to problems with metabolism which can have serious consequences.
How might emerging technologies accelerate our understanding of human physiology?
If one were to scope the challenge, How to Maintain Optimal Health and Fitness over a Maximum Lifespan for all Individuals in a Population, then developing a complete understanding of the dynamical biological universe of trillions of cells that in aggregate give rise to the human form is surely the starting point.
For the moment, we have a large body of knowledge but with many gaps; it is inevitable that within the next few decades we will understand human biology almost completely and these are the reasons:
- Sensing technologies are now nanoscale, and getting even smaller. Nanorobots can enter the blood and inform external data receivers on the status of pretty much whatever is required.
- Imaging is an exponentially improving technology that has also reached nanoscale and continues to advance, an impressive industrious effort driven by commerce and scientific research.
- The computation of data from these sources is also improving exponentially, as are data storage capacities thereby enabling scientists and technologists to solve increasingly complex problems, improving our understanding of the science involved in relation to metabolic pathways, biomarkers, exploration and the application of the dark genome for personalised medicines, and a lot more.
- The cost of healthcare in major western economies is reaching double-digit percentages of their respective GDPs, leading to wholly unsustainable fiscal positions. We’ve seen war economies, post-war economies, consumer economies, and surely, we’re about to enter the ‘aging population-healthcare’ economy in which the main battle is the financing of quality health into old age, and indeed on the back of that, the financing of longevity.
- Because healthcare needs are already causing extreme and growing financial pressures, they will necessarily be massively disrupted leading to much improved healthcare from ubiquitous digital assets, globally available healthcare knowledge, and highly advanced technologies that can monitor, inform/ alarm, and advise appropriate action.
Perhaps the ultimate method to address the challenge is the development of a ‘digital twin’ for all individuals, such a resource would get a free ride from the many rapidly emerging and developing technologies. Nascent digital twins are already available and over time, decades likely, may converge to provide real-time live molecular granularity.
What people would do with such present tense information from their digital twin (one could say our health avatar) is hard to predict but given our predilection for so many things that are manifestly bad for us, junk food et al must surely come to an abrupt end.
The clamour to achieve these strident goals in healthcare is evident from the tens of millions of USDs being invested annually into digital health, and maybe, just maybe, if all the knowledge that has been discovered and developed over the past two decades in this arena could somehow be suitably aggregated then the digital twin might arrive sooner than we think.
The upcycles of exponential improvements in the price-performance of digital technologies, improving the rate of scientific discoveries, leading to new and improved technologies, starts to feel close to a perpetual cycle of advancement and certainly helps drive improvement in healthcare.
Time to knuckle down
The metabolism is highly instrumental here because it helps to provide the feedback necessary, for example from biomarkers (naturally occurring molecules, genes, or characteristics by which a particular pathological or physiological process or disease can be identified) to understand the efficacy of new therapies incrementally over time, rather than waiting for results at some endpoint.
The biological clock regulates the body's metabolism; hence it represents both digital-twin nirvana, and an accelerated resource to decoding human biology! It’s time to increase our investment in understanding biological clocks.
There will be much to learn from biological clocks, as they comprise a range of naturally evolved algorithms that may be pointers to areas of optimal coordination that are new to us.
With some concerns that Moore’s Law is coming to an end or indeed over, and with novel computing paradigms yet to show their teeth, there remains considerable scope to optimise digital computing thus improving the operating optimisation of computing resources, another potential feedback loop perhaps…from biological clocks to computing clocks, and from fragmented and poorly advised populations to ubiquitous live digital twins, we see great convergences in emerging technologies that will wholly transform healthcare.
Mike E. Halsall, Sept 2022
Comments