melatonin

No summary available for this substance.

Melatonin

Melatonin is a hormone that your body produces naturally, which signals to your brain that it's time to sleep. This hormone’s levels rise at night and fall in the morning. Melatonin supplements are popular for various conditions including sleep issues related to shift work, jet lag, and insomniac conditions.

Category
Hormone
Molecular Formula
C13H16N2O2
Mechanism of Action
Melatonin binds to receptors in the body to help increase the activity of RAS proteins that promote sleep, and decrease the activity of RAS proteins that encourage wakefulness.
Evidence Grade
A

Other Names

  • N-Acetyl-5-Methoxytryptamine

Primary Benefits

  • Promotes sleep
  • Reduces time to fall asleep
  • Helps with jet lag

Recommended Dosage

Daily 1-10 mg
Max Daily 10 mg

Side Effects

  • Headache
  • Dizziness
  • Nausea
  • Drowsiness

Precautions

  • Not recommended for pregnant or breastfeeding women
  • May affect hormonal function
  • Do not drive or operate machinery after taking melatonin

Interactions

  • May interact with certain medications, including blood thinners, immunosuppressants, diabetes medications, and birth control pills

Key References

  • Lemoine P, Nir T, Laudon M, Zisapel N. Prolonged-release melatonin improves sleep quality and morning alertness in insomnia patients aged 55 years and older and has no withdrawal effects. J Sleep Res. 2007;16(4):372-380.
  • Auld F, Maschauer EL, Morrison I, Skene DJ, Riha RL. Evidence for the efficacy of melatonin in the treatment of primary adult sleep disorders. Sleep Med Rev. 2017;34:10-22.
Peptide & Hormone Therapies for Health, Performance & Longevity | Dr. Craig Koniver
Exploring Peptides, Hormones, and Therapies for Health and Wellness 1:37:01 0
“maybe they just throw some melatonin in there and call it pinin”

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342 ‒ Aging well: Peter shares strategies for improving longevity with residents at senior living
Strategies for Longevity: Enhancing Health and Wellness at All Stages 32:30 0
“melatonin can aid at least with sleep initiation but it's important to know that melatonin really is only the signal to initiate sleep it's not going to necessarily keep you asleep all night.”

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Sleep, Daylight Anchoring, and Effects on Memory & Obesity with Dan Pardi
Understanding the Connection Between Sleep, Light, and Health Outcomes 6:55 0
“So it is the perception of light by the eye which is eventually the trigger to say, Okay. It's becoming dark. Produce melatonin.”

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Sleep, Daylight Anchoring, and Effects on Memory & Obesity with Dan Pardi
Understanding the Connection Between Sleep, Light, and Health Outcomes 7:00 0
“And then melatonin, we think of that as a sleepiness hormone, but it has fairly weak soporific activity, which means it's not a very strong stimulator for sleep, but it's more of a reinforcer that it is in fact dark out.”

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Sleep, Daylight Anchoring, and Effects on Memory & Obesity with Dan Pardi
Understanding the Connection Between Sleep, Light, and Health Outcomes 7:15 0
“And so it's telling all the clocks within the suprachiasmatic nucleus, Yeah, it's now nighttime. Do nighttime activities. So it will affect the transcription and the translation activity that's happening.”

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Sleep, Daylight Anchoring, and Effects on Memory & Obesity with Dan Pardi
Understanding the Connection Between Sleep, Light, and Health Outcomes 8:04 0
“But back to the melatonin, the functions, it's a hormone, and it controls over 500 genes in the body, and as you mentioned, it's shutting down certain metabolic processes, and the shutdown of those processes are important for other ones to be turned on at certain times, so it's very important for regulating metabolism.”

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Sleep, Daylight Anchoring, and Effects on Memory & Obesity with Dan Pardi
Understanding the Connection Between Sleep, Light, and Health Outcomes 9:21 0
“There has been studies that have been done with supplemental melatonin in breast cancer patients, two small clinical trials I've seen. There's been other cancer studies as well, but they're given them really high doses of melatonin, and in conjunction with other traditional therapies like radiation, it increases, like, the one-year survival rate from 36% to, like, 65%, or something like that.”

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Sleep, Daylight Anchoring, and Effects on Memory & Obesity with Dan Pardi
Understanding the Connection Between Sleep, Light, and Health Outcomes 53:41 0
“again, B6 affects the conversion of tryptophan into serotonin, which then gets converted into melatonin, and magnesium affects the conversion of serotonin into melatonin, and it's a GABA agonist.”

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Wim Hof (the Iceman) on Defeating Extreme Cold & Attenuating the Immune Response
Enhancing Health Through Natural Methods and Breathing Techniques Benefits 45:58 0
“Melatonin, serotonin, the hormone production, etc.”

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The Science & Practice of Perfecting Your Sleep | Huberman Lab Essentials
Optimizing Sleep Quality: Insights, Recommendations, and Practical Suggestions 20:01 0
“Melatonin essentially tells the brain and the body when it's day and when it's night and with that when it's time to sleep and when it's time to wake.”

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The Science & Practice of Perfecting Your Sleep | Huberman Lab Essentials
Optimizing Sleep Quality: Insights, Recommendations, and Practical Suggestions 21:19 0
“Melatonin will only increase total amount of sleep by 3.9 minutes on average and it will only increase your sleep efficiency by 2.2%.”

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The Science & Practice of Perfecting Your Sleep | Huberman Lab Essentials
Optimizing Sleep Quality: Insights, Recommendations, and Practical Suggestions 22:26 0
“Melatonin supplementation in older adults, especially those with insomnia, is often prescribed because the pineal gland's function declines, affecting sleep.”

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The Science & Practice of Perfecting Your Sleep | Huberman Lab Essentials
Optimizing Sleep Quality: Insights, Recommendations, and Practical Suggestions 24:19 0
“The optimal doses for where you do get sleep benefits in the populations that we've looked at are somewhere between 0.1 and 0.3 millig of melatonin.”

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The Root Cause of Metabolic Dysfunction w/ Dr. Casey Means
Understanding Metabolic Health: Risks, Dysfunction, and Dietary Recommendations 1:15:25 0
“if we want to eat more during sunlight hours then we may need to eating our dinner at different times in the summer versus the winter because we know that like once that melatonin starts getting secretion it does impact our insulin sensitivity”

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#1 SLEEP EXPERT: You Might Have a HIDDEN Medical Condition WRECKING Your Sleep!
Hidden Medical Conditions Impacting Sleep: Expert Insights and Tips 22:01 0
“melatonin now is being more and more used in the pediatric setting so you'll see these melatonin gummies for kids and there was some data gosh now probably 30 years ago looking at juvenile male rats meaning that they're going through that sort of adolescent phase and they were getting dosed with high amounts of melatonin and that high dosing of melatonin in the juvenile male rats actually stunted their sexual development.”

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#1 SLEEP EXPERT: You Might Have a HIDDEN Medical Condition WRECKING Your Sleep!
Hidden Medical Conditions Impacting Sleep: Expert Insights and Tips 34:39 0
“there are ways that you can artificially delay your natural melatonin release a good one would be being exposed to too much light in the evening too much artificial light”

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#1 SLEEP EXPERT: You Might Have a HIDDEN Medical Condition WRECKING Your Sleep!
Hidden Medical Conditions Impacting Sleep: Expert Insights and Tips 37:58 0
“melatonin has had this meteoric rise in the sleep supplement world and now here at least in America where it's not regulated by the FDA you can go into a supermarket or a grocery store and down the sort of the health food section um there is this big sort of purple sector and that is the melatonin sector.”

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#1 SLEEP EXPERT: You Might Have a HIDDEN Medical Condition WRECKING Your Sleep!
Hidden Medical Conditions Impacting Sleep: Expert Insights and Tips 38:19 0
“melatonin it can be useful to help regulate your circadian rhythm and so I will use it strategically if I'm traveling if let's say I go back home to the United Kingdom and I live just outside of San Francisco it's 8 hours ahead so I can use it to try to trick my brain into thinking: Oh it's nighttime on the first night I arrive in the UK.”

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#1 SLEEP EXPERT: You Might Have a HIDDEN Medical Condition WRECKING Your Sleep!
Hidden Medical Conditions Impacting Sleep: Expert Insights and Tips 38:53 0
“melatonin will only increase the speed with which you fall asleep by about 2.2 minutes and it will only increase the efficiency of your sleep by about 3.7% which isn't that much more above and beyond placebo.”

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#1 SLEEP EXPERT: You Might Have a HIDDEN Medical Condition WRECKING Your Sleep!
Hidden Medical Conditions Impacting Sleep: Expert Insights and Tips 39:34 0
“melatonin isn't a particularly effective sleep aid it's the reason that you will never see people being prescribed melatonin for insomnia for the most part unless they have some kind of circadian rhythm disorder.”

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#1 SLEEP EXPERT: You Might Have a HIDDEN Medical Condition WRECKING Your Sleep!
Hidden Medical Conditions Impacting Sleep: Expert Insights and Tips 40:04 0
“because it's not regulated here by the FDA you don't know the purity and there was a great study that's been replicated and they looked at I think it was about 20 different vendors of melatonin and they sampled what was inside of the pill based on what they said on the bottle versus what was actually in the pill it ranged from about 80% less than what it said to 460% more than what it stated on the label.”

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#1 SLEEP EXPERT: You Might Have a HIDDEN Medical Condition WRECKING Your Sleep!
Hidden Medical Conditions Impacting Sleep: Expert Insights and Tips 50:57 0
“that's a little bit about both melatonin the sort of the emergence of these new flavors of sleep medications and then an alternative should people wish for that”

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Intermittent Fasting to Improve Health, Cognition & Longevity | Dr. Satchin Panda
Optimize Health and Longevity Through Timed Nutritional Strategies for Rhythms 1:24:30 0
“Their melatonin rhythms and cortisol rhythms and sleep wake rhythms persisted on that schedule for several weeks despite returning to environments where there was a lot of artificial lighting.”

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How to Improve Your Eye Health & Offset Vision Loss | Dr. Jeffrey Goldberg
Enhancing Eye Health Through Lifestyle Choices and Preventative Measures 1:31:53 0
“I think it's important to avoid Bright Lights of any wavelength late at night if you want your melatonin production to be normal and you want to sleep well.”

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REVERSE AGING: What To Eat & When To Eat For LONGEVITY | David Sinclair
Enhance Health, Longevity, and Disease Prevention with Lifestyle Choices 1:26:12 0
“There are supplements, there's one called L-theanine, a bit of melatonin works well for me.”

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Simple Fixes For A Good Night’s Rest – Shawn Stevenson (4K)
Improving sleep quality through lifestyle choices and health awareness tips 39:55 0
“cherries are one of the most dense sources of naturally occurring melatonin of any food.”

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Simple Fixes For A Good Night’s Rest – Shawn Stevenson (4K)
Improving sleep quality through lifestyle choices and health awareness tips 1:04:54 0
“You can have the best sleep routine if you're not providing your body with those raw materials those building blocks to help with the conversion of Serotonin into melatonin which serotonin is the prerequisite for making melatonin by the way that all has to do most of your serotonin is in your gut.”

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Supercharge Your VO2 Max & Protect Your Heart – Dr Andy Galpin
Maximize Longevity Through Lifestyle Choices and Optimal Health Strategies 2:07:25 0
“pretty active I'm like great what you need is another 75 grams of carbohydrate at dinner like what all we did was that insulin went back up sex hormone Bing globin went back down testosterone went right back up slept completely through the night instantaneously basically always and guess what happens to serotonin melatonin they go right back in normal cortisol curve is perfect”

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How To Fix Your Sleep & Supercharge Your Life – Dr Matthew Walker
Optimizing Sleep for Enhanced Health and Well-being: Comprehensive Insights 58:41 0
“the release of melatonin is not in this standard beautiful where melatonin Peaks just before you go to sleep stays high and then drops down low you just get this really flat profile of melatonin as you get older”

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How To Fix Your Sleep & Supercharge Your Life – Dr Matthew Walker
Optimizing Sleep for Enhanced Health and Well-being: Comprehensive Insights 1:55:53 0
“melatonin I think over here it's so easily purchased you go down you know any grocery store and in the health food section there's this big purple subsection and that's the Melatonin section and you've got you know 10 milligram 20 milligrams I've seen 50 milligrams firstly 5 milligrams 10 20 milligrams these are what we call Super physiological doses meaning that they are levels of melatonin that your body would never naturally release far higher than your body's natural tendency”

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How To Fix Your Sleep & Supercharge Your Life – Dr Matthew Walker
Optimizing Sleep for Enhanced Health and Well-being: Comprehensive Insights 1:56:25 0
“the fear here although there are some studies that people have argued this is not the case but the fear is just like testosterone replacement at some point your testes if you're exogenously injecting will just stop producing innate testosterone and once they stop they don't restart the worry is the same with your pineal gland which is going to release melatonin that if you keep exogenously giving your brain vast amounts it says well you're giving it to me so I don't need to produce it anymore and once it stops does it ever restart”

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How To Fix Your Sleep & Supercharge Your Life – Dr Matthew Walker
Optimizing Sleep for Enhanced Health and Well-being: Comprehensive Insights 1:58:46 0
“melatonin only improved the speed with which you fell asleep by about 3.9 minutes which is not that much more relative Placebo and it only improved your sleep efficiency by about 2.2% so again largely trivial”

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How To Fix Your Sleep & Supercharge Your Life – Dr Matthew Walker
Optimizing Sleep for Enhanced Health and Well-being: Comprehensive Insights 2:02:27 0
“Melatonin is now being replicated they did a study originally where they looked at at least 20 different brands off the shelf of melatonin and then they tested based on what it said on the bottle versus what was inside the capsules what it turned out was actually what you were swallowing was anywhere between 83% less than what it said was on the bottle to 464 per more.”

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The 5 Compounds that Detoxify & Protect the Brain (neuroprotectants) – Dr. Sherr
Understanding the Visual Programming Language Processing for Creative Expression 25:31 0
“you had me uh start taking you know Tromune which is your product that has it you had you know for for sleep issues because I didn't want to take melatonin right i didn't want to like well just you know take take one of these and that was I mean some serious deep sleep with it and it's not like a melatoniny feeling it's just like you I mean your sleep everything's normal you just feel like you got a little bit deeper sleep so that's how I first got turned on to it”

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Exercise & Nutrition Scientist: The Truth About Exercise On Your Period! Take These 4 Supplements!
Optimizing Women's Health and Performance Through Physiological Understanding 1:27:25 0
“for men they don't have that perturbation for men we see that um chronologically they tend to have a melatonin Peak that's later than women so they tend to want to stay up later and they can sleep in but they can also have shorter sleeps”

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Exercise & Nutrition Scientist: The Truth About Exercise On Your Period! Take These 4 Supplements!
Optimizing Women's Health and Performance Through Physiological Understanding 1:27:53 0
“women suffer more with jet lag and if so why why is that because if we're looking at our circadian rhythms and how long they are like I said melatonin Peaks earlier for women than men and we have a slightly different”

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Muscle Expert (Jeff Cavaliere): You Need To Know This About Creatine! Melt Belly Fat With 1 Change!
Understanding Fitness: Diet, Exercise, Mental Health, and Long-term Well-being 2:03:33 0
“My view is I believe it to be safe. I believe it to be helpful, you know, for people that are having a problem establishing a normal sleep pattern.”

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