Longevity among blowfliesPhormia terraenovae R.D. kept in non-24-hour light-dark cycles

Paul, Ursula von Saint; Aschoff, Jürgen

doi:10.1007/bf01350109

Cited by 92 publications

(33 citation statements)

References 16 publications

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“…Fruitflies [10] and blowflies [11] live longer under a 24 h light-dark cycle than under various other periods or under continuous light conditions. Tomatoes grow faster under a 24 h light -dark cycle than under shorter or longer cycles or even in continuous light [12 -14].…”

Section: Empirical Evidence For a Selective Advantage Of Circadian Rhmentioning

confidence: 95%

Evolution of time-keeping mechanisms: early emergence and adaptation to photoperiod

Hut

Beersma

2011

Phil. Trans. R. Soc. B

183

193

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Virtually all species have developed cellular oscillations and mechanisms that synchronize these cellular oscillations to environmental cycles. Such environmental cycles in biotic (e.g. food availability and predation risk) or abiotic (e.g. temperature and light) factors may occur on a daily, annual or tidal time scale. Internal timing mechanisms may facilitate behavioural or physiological adaptation to such changes in environmental conditions. These timing mechanisms commonly involve an internal molecular oscillator (a 'clock') that is synchronized ('entrained') to the environmental cycle by receptor mechanisms responding to relevant environmental signals ('Zeitgeber', i.e. German for time-giver). To understand the evolution of such timing mechanisms, we have to understand the mechanisms leading to selective advantage. Although major advances have been made in our understanding of the physiological and molecular mechanisms driving internal cycles (proximate questions), studies identifying mechanisms of natural selection on clock systems (ultimate questions) are rather limited. Here, we discuss the selective advantage of a circadian system and how its adaptation to day length variation may have a functional role in optimizing seasonal timing. We discuss various cases where selective advantages of circadian timing mechanisms have been shown and cases where temporarily loss of circadian timing may cause selective advantage. We suggest an explanation for why a circadian timing system has emerged in primitive life forms like cyanobacteria and we evaluate a possible molecular mechanism that enabled these bacteria to adapt to seasonal variation in day length. We further discuss how the role of the circadian system in photoperiodic time measurement may explain differential selection pressures on circadian period when species are exposed to changing climatic conditions (e.g. global warming) or when they expand their geographical range to different latitudes or altitudes.

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Section: Empirical Evidence For a Selective Advantage Of Circadian Rhmentioning

confidence: 95%

Evolution of time-keeping mechanisms: early emergence and adaptation to photoperiod

Hut

Beersma

2011

Phil. Trans. R. Soc. B

183

193

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“…In insects, adult lifespan is significantly reduced because of deleterious effects of light, including that of LL or non-24 h LD cycles (Pittendrigh and Minis, 1972;von Saint-Paul and Aschoff, 1978), while DD is known to stimulate the defense system and enhance adult lifespan (Shostal and Moskalev, 2013). Similarly, a few other studies have reported higher adult lifespan in flies maintained under DD compared with those kept in LD or LL (Allemand et al, 1973;Sheeba et al, 2000).…”

Section: Adult Lifespanmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Disruption of circadian timing systems results in reduced reproductive output in the gypsy moth, Lymantria dispar (Giebultowicz et al, 1990), and D. melanogaster (Beaver et al, 2002;Beaver et al, 2003), shortening of adult lifespan in D. melanogaster (Hendricks et al, 2003;Kumar et al, 2005), reduction in vegetative growth and survivorship in Arabidopsis thaliana (Dodd et al, 2005), and increased predation in free-living ground squirrels Spermophilus lateralis (DeCoursey et al, 1997) and chipmunks Tamias striatus (DeCoursey et al, 2000). Furthermore, circadian clocks in resonance with environmental light/dark (LD) cycles have been shown to enhance adult lifespan of D. melanogaster (Pittendrigh and Minis, 1972;Klarsfeld and Rouyer, 1998) and blow flies Phormia terraenovae (von Saint Paul and Aschoff, 1978), and competitive ability in cyanobacteria Synechococcus sp. (Ouyang et al, 1998).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Correlated changes in life history traits in response to selection for faster pre-adult development in the fruit fly Drosophila melanogaster

Yadav

Sharma

2014

Journal of Experimental Biology

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Insects including the fruit fly Drosophila melanogaster are under intense pressure to develop rapidly because they inhabit ephemeral habitats. We have previously shown that when selection for faster development was artificially imposed on D. melanogaster in the laboratory, reduction of pre-adult development time and shortening of the clock period occurs, suggesting a role for circadian clocks in the regulation of life history traits. Circadian clocks in D. melanogaster have also been implicated in the control of metabolic pathways, ageing processes, oxidative stress and defense responses to exogenous stressors. In order to rigorously examine correlations between pre-adult development time and other life history traits, we assayed pre-adult survivorship, starvation and desiccation resistance, body size and body weight, fecundity and adult lifespan in faster developing populations of D. melanogaster. The results revealed that selection for faster pre-adult development significantly reduced several adult fitness traits in the faster developing flies without affecting pre-adult survivorship. Although overall fecundity of faster developing flies was reduced, their egg output per unit body weight was significantly higher than that of controls, indicating that reduction in adult lifespan might be due to disproportionate investment in reproduction. Thus our results suggest that selection for faster preadult development in D. melanogaster yields flies with higher reproductive fitness. Because these flies also have shorter clock periods, our results can be taken to suggest that pre-adult development time and circadian clock period are correlated with various adult life history traits in D. melanogaster, implying that circadian clocks may have adaptive significance.

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“…In another study, the blowflies held under a LD 12:12 photoperiod, shifting the light phase every week for 6 h, lowered their average life span from 125 (con trol) to 98 days. Furthermore, their survival rate declined from 75 to 52% when kept in LL [19]. Regarding mammals, Halberg [20] placed BALB/c mice under a LD 12:12 cycle and altered the LD phase for 180° (LD 12:12 to DL 12:12) every week for 2 years; the mouse life span was reduced to 88.6 ± 2 weeks compared to 94.5 ± 2 weeks of the con trol group.…”

Section: %mentioning

confidence: 99%

Influences of Light-Dark Shifting on the Immune System, Tumor Growth and Life Span of Rats, Mice and Fruit Flies as well as on the Counteraction of Melatonin

Xu²

1997

Neurosignals

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Animal models were designed to study the changes in immune function, oncogenicity and life span of rats, mice and fruit flies following light-dark (LD) shift manipulations. Alternating the photoperiod of LD 14:10 and DL 10:14 every 3 days in rats disrupted the circadian immune rhythm pattern, decreased the blood leukocyte concentration by 48% and lowered the percentage of lymphocytes in the blood from 71% (control) to 49.2%. In mice, the phagocytosis of neutrophils was only reduced by 7%, but the level of serum hemolysin dropped significantly in the photoperiod-shifted group as compared with animals kept under a constant photoperiod of LD 12:12 or LD 14:10. In Ehrlich-carcinoma- or sarcoma-180-injected mice, a reduction of survival duration, acceleration of tumor growth and depression of the immune system were recorded in the LD-shifted animals. In addition, the life span of fruit flies was shortened by 9.6% by photoperiodic shifting. Melatonin treatment evidently counteracted the deleterious influences of photoperiodic shifting in the above animals. It is suggested that repeated inversion of the LD cycle results in a chronobiological abnormality that, in turn, induces dysfunctions. Reentrainment by exogenous melatonin may inhibit the harmful influences of photoperiodic shifting.

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Longevity among blowfliesPhormia terraenovae R.D. kept in non-24-hour light-dark cycles

Cited by 92 publications

References 16 publications

Evolution of time-keeping mechanisms: early emergence and adaptation to photoperiod

Evolution of time-keeping mechanisms: early emergence and adaptation to photoperiod

Correlated changes in life history traits in response to selection for faster pre-adult development in the fruit fly Drosophila melanogaster

Influences of Light-Dark Shifting on the Immune System, Tumor Growth and Life Span of Rats, Mice and Fruit Flies as well as on the Counteraction of Melatonin

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