Two opposing serotonergic neuronal circuits modulate ethanol preference of Drosophila melanogaster

TL;DRAbstract

Decision making is vital for Drosophila melanogaster to find food or avoid hazards. When offering wild type flies ethanol enriched food and food without ethanol, flies prefer 5% ethanol containing food (Ogueta et al., 2010). This behavior is caused by olfactory stimuli (Schneider et al., 2012). When the odor information is processed, the decision to approach one odor source has to be converted in movement. In addition, flies tend to climb up the vials after they have been shaken down which is known as negative geotaxis (Kamikouchi et al., 2009). Walking speed measured in negative geotaxis assays can be used to analyze locomotion behavior (Strauss and Heisenberg, 1993). The neurotransmitter serotonin (5-HT) modulates olfactory processing in antennal lobe of Drosophila (Dacks et al., 2007). Increased serotonin level by feeding 5-HTP, the serotonin precursor, also causes reduced locomotion activity in flies (Yuan et al., 2006). The role serotonin plays in ethanol preference has not been a

Chat with Paper

AI Agents for this Paper