Cave-Dwelling Fish Provide Clues to the Circadian Cycle 英文参考文献.docVIP

Synopsis Cave-DwellingFishProvideCluestotheCircadianCycle RobinMejia* FreelanceScienceWriter,Albany,California,UnitedStatesofAmerica Whether it’s a jay that starts its day at firstlight,anicewormthatburrowsintoa glacier when the sun comes out, or a bat thatheadsouttofeedatdusk,virtuallyall animals follow a daily pattern of activity. While the need for this kind of pattern, called the circadian rhythm, is not fully understood, it is remarkably conserved across species, and disruptions to an animal’s circadian cycle produce stress. Inhumans,suchdisruptionsareassociated withinsomniaanddepression. isolated from the day-night cycle for approximately1millionyearslongerthan morewell-studiedcavefishspecies.Having lived without sunlight for so many gener- ations, P. andruzzii no longer has any eye function or scales. But does loss of vision also mean loss of peripheral circadian clockregulationbylight? To assess whether P. andruzzii still possessed a light-responsive circadian clock, Cavallari and colleagues first ex- posedthefishtoalternating12-hourcycles oflightanddarkness.Theyfoundthatthe cavefish was active at irregular periods that did not relate to the light, whereas zebrafish kept under the same conditions exhibitedastandarddiurnalpattern.Next, the researchers measured the activity of cavefishgenesthatarehomologsofknown clock genes in the zebrafish. Measuring gene activity in adult tissue and whole larvae,onceagain,thescientistsfoundthat while the zebrafish genes responded to light,thecavefishgenesdidnot. The Somalian cavefish Phreatichthys an- druzzii were collected in the wild at the oasis of Bud-Bud in the center of the Somalian desert. Image Credit: Saulo Bambi. Asinmostmammals,thetimingofthe circadian clock appears to be in part maintainedbyexposuretodaylight.Cells intheretinareacttolight,sendingsignals to a ‘‘master’’ time keeper in the hypo- thalamus.That’swhylightexposurehelps us recover from jet lag; the daylight patterns of a new time zone eventu