This Article Full Text (PDF) References Alert me when this article is cited Alert me if a correction is posted Services Email this article to a friend Similar articles in this journal Similar articles in PubMed Alert me to new issues of the journal Add to Saved Citations Download to citation manager Request Permissions Request Reprints Add to My Marked Citations Citing Articles Citing Articles via Google Scholar Citing Articles via Scopus Google Scholar Articles by Tomioka, K. Articles by Chiba, Y. Search for Related Content PubMed PubMed Citation Articles by Tomioka, K. Articles by Chiba, Y. Social Bookmarking                         What's this?

Distribution of Circadian Photoreceptors in the Compound Eye of the Cricket Gryllus bimaculatus

Environment Biology Laboratory, Biological Institute, Faculty of Science, Yamaguchi University, Yamaguchi 753, Japan

Yasuo Okada

Environment Biology Laboratory, Biological Institute, Faculty of Science, Yamaguchi University, Yamaguchi 753, Japan

Yoshihiko Chiba

Environment Biology Laboratory, Biological Institute, Faculty of Science, Yamaguchi University, Yamaguchi 753, Japan

Adult male crickets (Gryllus bimaculatus) show a nocturnal circadian locomotor rhythm, which is driven by the pacemaker in the optic lamina-medulla complex and synchronizes to the light-dark (LD) cycle received by the compound eye. To see whether there was any specially differentiated circadian photoreceptor area in the eye, we examined the effect of a partial reduction of various areas of the compound eye, in addition to a removal of the contralateral optic lamina-medulla-compound eye complex, on entrainability of the locomotor rhythm. All operated animals showed a response to the LD cycle in their locomotor rhythm, no matter which area of the eye was left intact: They either stably entrained to an LD cycle or showed a sign of weak entrainment. The capacity for stable entrainment was still retained when only 262 ommatidia were left. Transient cycles needed for re entrainment, following a 6-hr phase advance of the LD cycle, were measured in 20 reduced-eye animals showing clear stable entrainment. They were in inverse proportion to the number of ommatidia in the reduced eye: The fewer ommatidia there were, the more transient cycles were observed (r = -0.76, p < 0.001). These results suggest that almost the whole area of the compound eye may contain circadian photoreceptors, and that the photic information from each ommatidium may additively affect the circadian clock to entrain via neural integration mechanisms.

Journal of Biological Rhythms, Vol. 5, No. 4, 303-313 (1990)
DOI: 10.1177/074873049000500403


CiteULike    Complore    Connotea    Del.icio.us    Digg    Reddit    Technorati    Twitter    What's this?