Mutant males show abnormal conditioning in courtship tests.
Flies show an abnormal pattern of emergence; peaks of eclosion are abnormally early when pupae are kept in a 12 hour light-12 hour dark cycle. The average period length of the eclosion rhythm, when adults are kept in constant darkness, is 25.1 +/- 0.5 hours. Emergence is early compared to wild-type when pupae are entrained to a temperature cycle of 12 hours at 18oC and 12 hours at 24oC in constant light. The locomotor activity rhythm is abnormal; homozygotes kept in a 12 hour light-12 hour dark cycle show dawn and dusk bouts of locomotor activity that begin earlier and later, respectively, than wild-type, and the period of locomotor activity is longer than normal. The gat2 mutation appears to be semidominant with respect to the phase of the activity rhythms.
Semidominant; emerges prematurely in light-dark cycle. Eclosion and locomotor activity rhythms have abnormally long periods (about 25-26 hr instead of normal 24 hr). Mutant males have abnormally long periods of courtship song rhythms (Kyriacou); this phenotype is recessive.
