I should like to know roughly how the hormone melotonin is synthetically made for the pharmaceutical industry (i.e. not how it is made in living beings). I can't seem to find any reference to its manufacture on the web, it is seen to have a fairly simple structure on its Wiki page and biologically it is synthesised from the forerunner amino acid tryptophan. So I believe it is likely to be readily synthesised for use in pharmaceuticals without the use of animal products, but I cannot confirm this.
Specifically, a close relative of mine has been prescribed melotonin and I want to confirm that this substance is not made from animal products, as I live in a country where the authorities in their great wisdom have deregulated the food and meat processing industries. Astoundingly, they did this at exactly the same time that a UK royal commission recommended re-regulation of the same to prevent contamination of food and pharmaceuticals by the Creutzfeld-Jacob prion.