A dopamine-gated learning circuit underpins reproductive state-dependent odor preference in Drosophila females.

ABSTRACT: Motherhood induces a drastic, sometimes long-lasting, change in internal state and behavior in many female animals. How a change in reproductive state or the discrete event of mating modulates specific female behaviors is still incompletely understood. Using calcium imaging of the whole brain of Drosophila females, we find that mating does not induce a global change in brain activity. Instead, mating modulates the pheromone response of dopaminergic neurons innervating the fly's learning and memory center, the mushroom body (MB). Using the mating-induced increased attraction to the odor of important nutrients, polyamines, we show that disruption of the female fly's ability to smell, for instance the pheromone cVA, during mating leads to a reduction in polyamine preference for days la

SUBMITTER: Boehm AC 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC9536836 | biostudies-literature | 2022 Sep

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature