The story

In 1958 Aaron Lerner, a dermatologist at Yale, isolated melatonin from bovine pineal glands while looking for the factor that lightens frog skin. Russel Reiter in Texas later showed it is a powerful antioxidant and called it a protector of aging cells. In St. Petersburg, Vladimir Anisimov at the Petrov Institute of Oncology and Vladimir Khavinson studied the pineal gland as a regulator of ageing. They showed melatonin and the pineal peptide Epithalamin restore the night rhythm and act as geroprotectors.