The effect of melatonin on clock-regualted genes in renal tubular epithelial cell

The expression of clock genes are co-regulated by BMAL1 and CLOCK in all tissue including kidney. Whether these clock-regualted genes can be affected by melatonin still unclaer. To further examine the possible mechanism and biological consequence, we depleted BMAL1 or CLOCK with small interfering RNA (siRNA) and treated cells with melatonin. Then, we used microarray analyses to identify clock genes regulated by melatonin in renal tubular epithelial cell. Human renal tubular epithelial cells (HK2) cells were transfected with 10 nmol/L specific siRNA oligonucleotides against BMAL1/CLOCK or treated with 10 nM melatonin. Total RNA was extracted from BMAL1/CLOCK-depleted cell or melatonin-treated HK-2 cells.