WEDNESDAY, Jan. 28 (HealthDay News) -- Gene mutations in fruit flies that shorten sleep time also affect their sensitivity to volatile anesthetics, according to research published in the February issue of Anesthesiology.

Bernd Weber, Ph.D., from University Hospital Schleswig-Holstein in Kiel, Germany, and colleagues assessed sleep and wakefulness at different concentrations of isoflurane and sevoflurane in the Drosophila melanogaster (fruit fly) Shaker gene mutants minisleeper, 120, and 102, which sleep significantly less than normal flies.

The researchers found that sleep time was significantly shorter in the mutants, with the 102 mutant most affected (mean, 412 minutes versus 965 minutes for wild-type flies), followed by the minisleeper (mean, 584 minutes) and 120 (mean, 782 minutes) mutants. The half-maximum effective concentrations for isoflurane and sevoflurane were 0.706 and 1.298 for wild-type flies, 1.599 and 2.329 for the 102 mutant, 1.306 and 2.013 for the minisleeper mutant, and 0.957 and 1.619 for the 120 mutant, which all differed significantly from wild-type flies, the report indicates.

"A single-gene mutation in Drosophila that causes an extreme reduction in daily sleep is responsible for a significant increase in the requirement of volatile anesthetics," Weber and colleagues conclude. "This suggests that a single gene mutation affects both sleep behavior and anesthesia and sedation."

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