In the discussion on fruit flies, sleep-wake studies we went on to discuss circadian rhythm which got Nobel Prize in year 2017. On the Nobel Prize website there was discussion given on Mimosa leaf opening and closing activity rhythm: https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/medicine/2017/press-release/
@Theertha summarized it by explaining that Mimosa opens its leaves in day and closes in night, a scientist kept Mimosa in 24hrs dark, and saw that Mimosa behaves the same. This gave idea that the rhythm is internal clock. Cubists are trying to understand ‘jet lag’ and internal clock in sleep-wake studies.
For example, when a person travels from India to America, and reaches at Day time, he still feels sleepy. This is because there is 12 hrs time period gap between America and India. Hence, when we reach in America in day time, our body clock still is in night mode. This indicates our sleep-wake cycle is also internal clock.
On the website of Nobel prize there was a mention of Seymour Benzer and Ronald Konopka who were studying circadian rhythm in fruit flies and had identified per gene responsible for circadian rhythm in fruit flies. It was also shared that Obaid Siddiqi who is also a founding inspiration behind CUBE had worked with Seymour Benzer.
By this we also discussed that there is role of some genes in internal clock in fruit flies. There must be some genes also involved in sleep-wake cycle in fruit flies.
We need to understand how can we relate this internal clock with studies on sleep-wake activity in fruit flies? Can we design an experiment to show that fruit flies also have internal clock for their activity?