Angelman syndrome and melatonin: What can they teach us about sleep regulation

In 1965 Dr. Harry Angelman reported a neurodevelopmental disorder affecting three unrelated children who had similar symptoms: brachycephaly, mental retardation, ataxia, seizures, protruding tongues, and remarkable paroxysms of laughter. Over the past 50 years, the disorder became Angelman’s namesake and symptomology was expanded to include hyper-activity, stereotypies, and severe sleep disturbances. The sleep disorders in many Angelman syndrome (AS) patients are broadly characterized by difficulty falling and staying asleep at night. Some of these patients sleep less than 4 hours a night and, in most cases, do not make up this lost-sleep during the day—leading to the speculation that AS patients may “need” less sleep. Most AS patients also have severely reduced levels of melatonin, a hormone produced by the pineal gland exclusively at night. This nightly pattern of melatonin production is thought to help synchronize internal circadian rhythms and promote nighttime sleep in humans and other diurnal species. It has been proposed that reduced melatonin levels contribute to the sleep problems in AS patients. Indeed, emerging evidence suggests melatonin replacement therapy can improve sleep in many AS patients. However, AS mice show sleep problems that are arguably similar to those in humans despite being on genetic backgrounds that do not make melatonin. This suggests the hypothesis that the change in nighttime melatonin may be a secondary factor rather than the root cause of the sleeping disorder. The goals of this review article are to revisit the sleep and melatonin findings in both AS patients and animal models of AS and discuss what AS may tell us about the underlying mechanisms of, and interplay between, melatonin and sleep.