Do insects sleep?

Rest is also important for the life of insects, who can sleep soundly and respond to stimulants such as caffeine.

Measuring sleep in insects is no easy task. In many species there are periods of apparent inactivity, but do they sleep like us? A study carried out by the University of Pennsylvania and the California Institute of Neuroscience has revealed that fruit flies do so in a way so deep that when they are at rest, it is difficult to wake them up. Also, if they do not get enough rest, they show clear symptoms of sleep deprivation, and react in the same way as people to caffeine or sleeping pills.

In fact, there is an insect that has a high tolerance for caffeine: it is the coffee borer, Hypothenemus hampei, a tiny beetle that lives in the berries of the plant, where pure caffeine is found in concentrations lethal to most Insects and many other animals. If you were a human, your coffee consumption would be equivalent to drinking more than 200 expresses a day. The secret of this insect is that it has in its guts up to 14 types of bacteria, which help you tolerate such high doses of caffeine. One of them is Pseudomonas fulva. This bacterium has a gene responsible for it so easily degrade caffeine and survive solely with it.

As is the case with humans, effective communication between members of a society is fundamental to maintaining community life. That is why night rest is so important also for a type of insect: bees.

They, on the other hand, are not able to communicate effectively with their counterparts if they have not been able to make a headscarf. When the flowers close at night, they sleep with their jaws closed around a stem or twig, which prevents them from falling to the ground. The communication between bees is made in a very sophisticated way. Through a kind of dance, or stimuli such as the smell of pheromones, inform the individuals in your society where to find food.

Therefore, a bee "bad rested" could be a disaster for the collective life and prosperity of the hive. Life in the hive is very demanding for bees; The drones, for example, are expelled or starved when they are no longer needed (at the end of the reproductive period of virgin queens). On the other hand, worker bees choose larvae of less than three days when they begin to observe that a queen bee is being inefficient.

However, there are thousands of types of bees. Some of them live in community, but some live alone. Those who live in society, form colonies of between 15,000 and 80,000 individuals.

Insects are the most abundant type of living being on Earth. In fact, the entire surface of the Earth is covered by insects, except Antarctica, and it is estimated that there are about 10 billion insects per square kilometer on the Earth's surface. However, despite its abundance, there are still many data on insects that we do not know.

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