Visual circadian rhythmicity in splitbrain crayfish: a plastic behavioral expression of symmetric circadian pacemakers.

Electroretinographic evoked potentials (ERG's) were continuously recorded in dark-adapted, splitbrain crayfishes Procambarus bouvieri. Pulses of light (0.95 cd/m2) illuminating the left or the right eyes were alternatively applied every 15 or 30 min. As compared to intact crayfish, uni or bilateral damping or suppression of circadian retinal sensitivity rhythm could be caused by surgical bisection of cerebral ganglion in these crustaceans. The damped ERG circadian rhythm was rapidly reversed by reduction or elimination of the test light stimulus to the contralateral eye. Given the redundant processing of pacemaking information coming from bilaterally positioned cephalic circadian pacemakers to the central nervous system in splitbrain crayfish, photodependent damping of ERG rhythm revealed a plastic potential of central circadian pacemakers. The possibility that a strong but reversible inhibitory influence acts simultaneously upon the left and right protocerebral circadian pacemakers while receiving bilateral photic stimulation is considered.