Abstract
Comparative studies of circadian activity rhythms were performed with three stocks of the species Pterostichus rhaeticus Heer (from Southern Europe, Central Europe, and the Subarctic) and with one Central European stock of the sibling species Pterostichus nigrita Paykull. The hehaviour was investigated in various LD conditions, constant conditions including LL with changes of the illumination intensity and constant darkness with light pulses. The data were analysed with the program system “Timesdia” containing various techniques like power spectrum estimation, periodogram analysis and complex demodulation. This allowed to reveal the time course of rhythms and to determine the number of phase jumps as a measure for precision. With the help of these methods, the activity patterns are classified in different types of behaviour: synchronization, temporarily synchronization, aperiodic behaviour, free run, temporarily free run, relative entrainment, and relative coordination. Besides graduated differences between the populations in south-to-north direction (e.g. in the tendency to rhythmic behaviour) the analysis revealed splitting of rhythms into two or even three components of different frequencies and transitions from rhythmic to aperiodic behaviour or vice versa after arbitrarily chosen light pulses in constant darkness. This behaviour cannot be explained by a system which is composed of one single limit cycle oscillator, but the results rather support a multi-oscillator model.
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