Abstract
Circadian rhythms help organisms adapt to their environment by predicting daily changes and are generated by the cyclic transcription, translation and degradation of core clock genes, including timeless. Circadian rhythms have been shown to be both responsive and compensatory to changes in environmental stimuli, such as temperature.Recently, our lab discovered that timeless contains four thermosensitive isoforms, which were linked to temperature adaptation.However, these isoforms have yet to be characterized. Here, we genetically characterized tim isoforms by creating Drosophila melanogaster with shRNAs directed to knockdown all, multiple or individual isoforms. We then determined the locomotor activity of these flies in 12:12 light:dark and inconstant darkness at three different temperatures to see the effect of the isoforms on temperature adaptation, rhythmicity and period.