scholarly journals Neural basis of hunger-driven behaviour in Drosophila

Open Biology ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 9 (3) ◽  
pp. 180259 ◽  
Author(s):  
Suewei Lin ◽  
Bhagyashree Senapati ◽  
Chang-Hui Tsao
Keyword(s):  
Nervous System ◽  
Drosophila Melanogaster ◽  
Fruit Fly ◽  
Model System ◽  
Neural Basis ◽  
Motivational State ◽  
Psychological Sense ◽  
Food Seeking ◽  
Behavioural Repertoire ◽  
Feeding Behaviours

Hunger is a motivational state that drives eating and food-seeking behaviour. In a psychological sense, hunger sets the goal that guides an animal in the pursuit of food. The biological basis underlying this purposive, goal-directed nature of hunger has been under intense investigation. With its rich behavioural repertoire and genetically tractable nervous system, the fruit fly Drosophila melanogaster has emerged as an excellent model system for studying the neural basis of hunger and hunger-driven behaviour. Here, we review our current understanding of how hunger is sensed, encoded and translated into foraging and feeding behaviours in the fruit fly.

scholarly journals Neural Changes Underlying Rapid Fly Song Evolution

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yun Ding ◽  
Joshua L. Lillvis ◽  
Jessica Cande ◽  
Gordon J. Berman ◽  
Benjamin J. Arthur ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Nervous System ◽  
Drosophila Melanogaster ◽  
Experimental Approach ◽  
Neural Circuits ◽  
Neural Circuitry ◽  
Courtship Song ◽  
Neural Basis ◽  
Electrophysiological Properties ◽  
Song Types ◽  
Behavioural Diversity

AbstractThe neural basis for behavioural evolution is poorly understood. Functional comparisons of homologous neurons may reveal how neural circuitry contributes to behavioural evolution, but homologous neurons cannot be identified and manipulated in most taxa. Here, we compare the function of homologous courtship song neurons by exporting neurogenetic reagents that label identified neurons in Drosophila melanogaster to D. yakuba. We found a conserved role for a cluster of brain neurons that establish a persistent courtship state. In contrast, a descending neuron with conserved electrophysiological properties drives different song types in each species. Our results suggest that song evolved, in part, due to changes in the neural circuitry downstream of this descending neuron. This experimental approach can be generalized to other neural circuits and therefore provides an experimental framework for studying how the nervous system has evolved to generate behavioural diversity.

scholarly journals The Fruit Fly Drosophila melanogaster as a Model System to Study Cholesterol Metabolism and Homeostasis

Cholesterol ◽  
2011 ◽  
Vol 2011 ◽  
pp. 1-6 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ryusuke Niwa ◽  
Yuko S. Niwa
Keyword(s):  
Drosophila Melanogaster ◽  
Steroid Hormones ◽  
Molecular Mechanisms ◽  
Cholesterol Metabolism ◽  
Cholesterol Biosynthesis ◽  
Fruit Fly ◽  
Model System ◽  
Biophysical Properties ◽  
Type C ◽  
Niemann Pick

Cholesterol has long been recognized for its versatile roles in influencing the biophysical properties of cell membranes and for serving as a precursor of steroid hormones. While many aspects of cholesterol biosynthesis are well understood, little is currently known about the molecular mechanisms of cholesterol metabolism and homeostasis. Recently, genetic approaches in the fruit fly, Drosophila melanogaster, have been successfully used for the analysis of molecular mechanisms that regulate cholesterol metabolism and homeostasis. This paper summarizes the recent studies on genes that regulate cholesterol metabolism and homeostasis, including neverland, Niemann Pick type C(NPC) disease genes, and DHR96.

scholarly journals Programmed cell death takes flight: genetic and genomic approaches to gene discovery in Drosophila

2002 ◽  
Vol 9 (2) ◽  
pp. 59-69 ◽  
Author(s):  
S. Gorski ◽  
M. Marra
Keyword(s):  
Cell Death ◽  
Drosophila Melanogaster ◽  
Programmed Cell Death ◽  
Gene Discovery ◽  
Fruit Fly ◽  
Model System ◽  
Physiological Process ◽  
Wide Spread ◽  
Cell Death Gene ◽  
Genetics And Genomics

Programmed cell death (PCD) is an essential and wide-spread physiological process that results in the elimination of cells. Genes required to carry out this process have been identified, and many of these remain the subjects of intense investigation. Here, we describe PCD, its functions, and some of the consequences when it goes awry. We review PCD in the model system, the fruit fly, Drosophila melanogaster, with a particular emphasis on cell death gene discovery resulting from both genetics and genomics-based approaches.

scholarly journals Genomic instability and cancer: lessons from Drosophila

Open Biology ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 10 (6) ◽  
pp. 200060
Author(s):  
Stephan U. Gerlach ◽  
Héctor Herranz
Keyword(s):  
Drosophila Melanogaster ◽  
Animal Models ◽  
Disease Progression ◽  
Genomic Instability ◽  
Genetic Disease ◽  
Current Knowledge ◽  
Fruit Fly ◽  
Model System ◽  
Human Tumours ◽  
Gradual Accumulation

Cancer is a genetic disease that involves the gradual accumulation of mutations. Human tumours are genetically unstable. However, the current knowledge about the origins and implications of genomic instability in this disease is limited. Understanding the biology of cancer requires the use of animal models. Here, we review relevant studies addressing the implications of genomic instability in cancer by using the fruit fly, Drosophila melanogaster , as a model system. We discuss how this invertebrate has helped us to expand the current knowledge about the mechanisms involved in genomic instability and how this hallmark of cancer influences disease progression.

scholarly journals The scoop on the fly brain: glial engulfment functions in Drosophila

2007 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
pp. 63-74 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mary A. Logan ◽  
Marc R. Freeman
Keyword(s):  
Nervous System ◽  
Drosophila Melanogaster ◽  
Glial Cells ◽  
Model System ◽  
Adult Brain ◽  
Trauma Studies ◽  
Ideal Model ◽  
Ideal Model System ◽  
Insight Into ◽  
Developing Nervous System

AbstractGlial cells provide support and protection for neurons in the embryonic and adult brain, mediated in part through the phagocytic activity of glia. Glial cells engulf apoptotic cells and pruned neurites from the developing nervous system, and also clear degenerating neuronal debris from the adult brain after neural trauma. Studies indicate that Drosophila melanogaster is an ideal model system to elucidate the mechanisms of engulfment by glia. The recent studies reviewed here show that many features of glial engulfment are conserved across species and argue that work in Drosophila will provide valuable cellular and molecular insight into glial engulfment activity in mammals.

scholarly journals A Systematic Nomenclature for the Drosophila Ventral Nervous System

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert Court ◽  
Shigehiro Namiki ◽  
J Douglas Armstrong ◽  
Jana Börner ◽  
Gwyneth Card ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Nervous System ◽  
Drosophila Melanogaster ◽  
Fruit Fly ◽  
Insect Brain ◽  
Nomenclature System ◽  
Motor Circuits ◽  
Neuroscience Research ◽  
Systematic Nomenclature ◽  
Uniform Nomenclature ◽  
Thoracic And Abdominal

AbstractThe fruit fly, Drosophila melanogaster, is an established and powerful model system for neuroscience research with wide relevance in biology and medicine. Until recently, research on the Drosophila brain was hindered by the lack of a complete and uniform nomenclature. Recognising this problem, the Insect Brain Name Working Group produced an authoritative hierarchical nomenclature system for the adult insect brain, using Drosophila melanogaster as the reference framework, with other taxa considered to ensure greater consistency and expandability (Ito et al., 2014). Here, we extend this nomenclature system to the sub-gnathal regions of the adult Drosophila nervous system, thus providing a systematic anatomical description of the ventral nervous system (VNS). This portion of the nervous system includes the thoracic and abdominal neuromeres that were not included in the original work and contains the motor circuits that play essential roles in most fly behaviours.

scholarly journals FlyLimbTracker: an active contour based approach for leg segment tracking in unmarked, freely behaving Drosophila

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Virginie Uhlmann ◽  
Pavan Ramdya ◽  
Ricard Delgado-Gonzalo ◽  
Richard Benton ◽  
Michael Unser
Keyword(s):  
Nervous System ◽  
Drosophila Melanogaster ◽  
Open Source ◽  
Active Contour ◽  
The Body ◽  
Software Implementation ◽  
Neural Basis ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
Freely Behaving ◽  
Leg Movements

AbstractUnderstanding the biological underpinnings of movement and action requires the development of tools for precise, quantitative, and high-throughput measurements of animal behavior. Drosophila melanogaster provides an ideal model for developing such tools: the fly has unparalleled genetic accessibility and depends on a relatively compact nervous system to generate sophisticated limbed behaviors including walking, reaching, grooming, courtship, and boxing. Here we describe a method that uses active contours to semi-automatically track body and leg segments from video image sequences of unmarked, freely behaving Drosophila. We show that this approach is robust to wide variations in video spatial and temporal resolution and that it can be used to measure leg segment motions during a variety of locomotor and grooming behaviors. FlyLimbTracker, the software implementation of this method, is open-source and our approach is generalizable. This opens up the possibility of tracking leg movements in other species by modifications of underlying active contour models.Author SummaryIn terrestrial animals, including humans, fundamental actions like locomotion and grooming emerge from the displacement of multiple limbs through space. Therefore, precise measurements of limb movements are critical for investigating and, ultimately, understanding the neural basis for behavior. The vinegar fly, Drosophila melanogaster, is an attractive animal model for uncovering general principles about limb control since its genome and nervous system are easy to manipulate. However, existing methods for measuring leg movements in freely behaving Drosophila have significant drawbacks: they require complicated experimental setups and provide limited information about each leg. Here we report a new method - and provide its open-source software implementation, FlyLimbTracker - for tracking the body and leg segments of freely behaving flies using only computational image processing approaches. We illustrate the power of this method by tracking fly limbs during five distinct walking and grooming behaviors and from videos across a wide range of spatial and temporal resolutions. Our approach is generalizable, allowing researchers to use and customize our software for limb tracking in Drosophila and in other species.

scholarly journals Rest is Required to Learn an Appetitively-Reinforced Operant Task in Drosophila

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Timothy D. Wiggin ◽  
Yung-Yi Hsiao ◽  
Jeffrey B. Liu ◽  
Robert Huber ◽  
Leslie C. Griffith
Keyword(s):  
Drosophila Melanogaster ◽  
Operant Conditioning ◽  
Food Reward ◽  
Molecular Mechanisms ◽  
Genetic Model ◽  
Fruit Fly ◽  
Model Organisms ◽  
Neural Basis ◽  
Operant Task ◽  
Insight Into

ABSTRACTMaladaptive operant conditioning contributes to development of neuropsychiatric disorders. Candidate genes have been identified that contribute to this maladaptive plasticity, but the neural basis of operant conditioning in genetic model organisms remains poorly understood. The fruit fly Drosophila melanogaster is a versatile genetic model organism that readily forms operant associations with punishment stimuli. However, operant conditioning with a food reward has not been demonstrated in flies, limiting the types of neural circuits that can be studied. Here we present the first sucrose-reinforced operant conditioning paradigm for flies. Flies of both sexes walk along a Y-shaped track with reward locations at the terminus of each hallway. When flies turn in the reinforced direction at the center of the track, sucrose is presented at the end of the hallway. Only flies that rest during training show evidence of learning the reward contingency. Flies rewarded independently of their behavior do not form a learned association but have the same amount of rest as trained flies, showing that rest is not driven by learning. Optogenetically-induced rest does not promote learning, indicating that rest is not sufficient for learning the operant task. We validated the sensitivity of this assay to detect the effect of genetic manipulations by testing the classic learning mutant dunce. Dunce flies are learning impaired in the Y-Track task, indicating a likely role for cAMP in the operant coincidence detector. This novel training paradigm will provide valuable insight into the molecular mechanisms of disease and the link between sleep and learning.SIGNIFICANCE STATEMENTOperant conditioning and mental health are deeply intertwined: maladaptive conditioning contributes to many pathologies, while therapeutic operant conditioning is a frequently used tool in talk therapy. Unlike drug interventions which target molecules or mechanisms, it is not known how operant conditioning changes the brain to promote wellness or distress. To gain mechanistic insight into how this form of learning works, we developed a novel operant training task for the fruit fly Drosophila melanogaster. We made three key discoveries. First, flies are able to learn an operant task to find food reward. Second, rest during training is necessary for learning. Third, the dunce gene is necessary for both classical and operant conditioning in flies, indicating that they may share molecular mechanisms.

scholarly journals Drosophila melanogaster as a model host to study arbovirus–vector interaction

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mandar S. Paingankar ◽  
Mangesh D. Gokhale ◽  
Deepti D. Deobagkar ◽  
Dileep N. Deobagkar
Keyword(s):  
Drosophila Melanogaster ◽  
Potential Model ◽  
Binding Assay ◽  
Fruit Fly ◽  
Model System ◽  
Pcr Analysis ◽  
Arbovirus Vector ◽  
Vector Interaction ◽  
Molecular Events ◽  
Protein Binding Assay

ABSTRACTArboviruses cause the most devastating diseases in humans and animals worldwide. Several hundred arbovirus are transmitted by mosquitoes, sand flies or ticks and are responsible for more than million deaths annually. Development of a model system is essential to extrapolate the molecular events occurring during infection in the human and mosquito host. Virus overlay protein binding assay (VOPBA) combined with MALDI TOF/TOF MS revealed that Dengue-2 virus (DENV-2) exploits similar protein molecules in Drosophila melanogaster and Aedes aegypti for its infection. Furthermore, the virus susceptibility studies revealed that DENV-2 could propagate in D. melanogaster, and DENV-2 produced in fruit fly is equally infectious to D. melanogaster and Ae. aegypti. Additionally, real time PCR analysis revealed that RNAi coupled with JAK-STAT and Toll pathway constitutes an effector mechanism to control the DENV-2 infection in flies. These observations point out that D. melanogaster harbors all necessary machineries to support the growth of arboviruses. With the availability of well-established techniques for genetic and developmental manipulations, D. melanogaster, offers itself as the potential model system for the study of arbovirus-vector interactions.

scholarly journals The Effects of Central Nervous System Stimulants on Drosophila melanogaster Reproduction

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Blake McMahon ◽  
Julia Willsie
Keyword(s):  
Central Nervous System ◽  
Nervous System ◽  
Drosophila Melanogaster ◽  
Fruit Fly ◽  
Human Fetuses ◽  
Stimulant Drugs ◽  
Central Nervous System Stimulants ◽  
The World ◽  
Experimental Populations

AbstractStimulant drugs are used everyday by people around the world. The effect stimulants have on developing human fetuses is widely unknown. The fruit fly Drosophila melanogaster has become a valuable system to model the complex effects and properties of drugs in mammals. In this study, Drosophila is used to analyze the effects of stimulant exposure on reproduction to determine if stimulants cause a significant decrease in the number of offspring produced by parent generations. Caffeine, nicotine, and pseudoephedrine hydrochloride were found to significantly decrease the number of offspring in experimental populations. Further experimentation is necessary to understand the mechanisms underlying these results.

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