earticle

영어

Relatively large amounts of GABA can be produced by the fermentation of rice bran. Therefore, this study was conducted to investigate the effects of GABA on the secretion of melatonin and serotonin for the development of a sleep inductive compound. The secretion levels of melatonin and serotonin from mice were found to be 3.425±0.182 pg/mL and 5.37±0.963 ng/mL, respectively, in response to feeding 120 mg/mL of GABA while they were 2.607±0.41 pg/mL in the control. The secretion of both melatonin and serotonin was increased up to the 13.51% and 34.99%, respectively, when compared to the negative control. However, the feeding of milk alone did not have a great effect on the melatonin and serotonin secretions. Conversely, feeding of milk with GABA enhanced the secretion of serotonin. The amounts of both melatonin and serotonin secreted increased with respect to the increase in GABA concentrations during feeding. Interestingly, the induction level of melatonin was relatively higher than that of serotonin in response to feeding 120 mg/ mL of GABA. This is the first study to report that GABA has an ability to induce sleep related hormones in mice; therefore, it has the potential for use as a natural sleep aid.