![]() ![]() Giant frigatebirds can spend months on the wing during ocean migrations. In some species there are differences between the sexes: male fruit-flies need more than 10 hours sleep a day, while females are fine on four, and can survive on less than 15 minutes’ sleep without it seeming to impact their chances of survival. Sometimes they went 48 hours without sleeping. African bush elephants sleep on average for two hours day, and mostly while standing up, one study found. Studies have shown some species routinely sleep very little, seemingly without negative costs to their performance while awake. The discovery that these birds are doing thousands of microsleeps lasting only four seconds is “unprecedented, even among penguins,” researchers wrote.įragmented sleep is thought to enable the penguins to stay more alert while protecting their eggs and young. The researchers studied 14 penguins incubating eggs, out of a colony of more than 2,700 breeding pairs. Extended sleep may put their eggs or young at risk of predation by brown skua birds or other penguins. They noted a slight increase in the depth of sleep at around noon, when risk of predation could be at its lowest.įor chinstrap penguins, one parent sits on the nest for several days at a time while the partner is away feeding. Microsleeps were shown by sleep-related brain activity and eye-closure. The researchers studied chinstrap penguins in the wild using electroencephalogram (EEG) monitoring and continuous video footage. ![]() Most sleep research is conducted in rats, mice and humans, but working on other species shows us at what point sleep is affected by environmental change.” Libourel said: “Sleep is at the core of animal behaviour, and is also under selective pressure. Sleep seems to be ubiquitous among animals, but it makes them vulnerable to predation because they lose the ability to respond quickly to the outside environment. Photograph: Paul-Antoine Libourel/Science Chinstrap penguins ‘sleeping’ on King George Island in Antarctica. ![]()
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