To tease out the relationships between sleep, starvation and survival, the researchers deprived fruit flies of both food and sleep. They found that starving fruit flies spent more time awake than satiated flies did. The researchers also tested the flies' saliva for enzymes that signal sleepiness and measured the flies' ability to associate a light with an unpleasant stimulus. Both tests showed that the starving flies were alert, not sleepy.

为了找到睡眠、饥饿和生存之间的关系，研究人员同时剥夺了果蝇的食物和睡眠。他们发现，饥饿的果蝇比吃饱的果蝇清醒的时间长。研究人员还检测了果蝇唾液中显示困倦程度的酶，还测试了果蝇将光亮与令人不快的刺激联系起来的能力。两种测试结果均表明饥饿的果蝇是清醒的，没有睡意。