Walton D. Jones edited discussion.tex  over 8 years ago

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We, therefore, expected that a behavioral investigation of the one and only fly T-type channel, DmCa\textsubscript{v}3, would uncover less subtle sleep phenotypes.  We were thus surprised to find, that despite its broad and relatively strong expression across adult fly brains, DmCa\textsubscript{v}3-null mutants, like the Ca\textsubscript{v}3.1-null mice, are homozygous viable and lack any overt phenotypes.  Upon closer examination, however, we observed that DmCa\textsubscript{v}3-null mutants sleep more than controls, especially in constant darkness.  The reason for this relative specificity in the sleep phenotype caused by DmCa\textsubscript{v}3 loss-of-function to constant darkness is still unclear.  Flies exhibit a burst of activity upon exposure to the early morning light but then sleep through most of the rest of the day.  Since control flies show less sleep during subjective daytime under continuous darkness than under the light phase of light-dark conditions (Fig. \ref{fig:3}c), it is clear that light exposure can also have sleep-promoting effects.