Natural polymorphism affecting learning and memory in Drosophila. Export

@article{citeulike:1474644, abstract = {Knowing which genes contribute to natural variation in learning and memory would help us understand how differences in these cognitive traits evolve among populations and species. We show that a natural polymorphism at the foraging (for) locus, which encodes a cGMP-dependent protein kinase (PKG), affects associative olfactory learning in Drosophila melanogaster. In an assay that tests the ability to associate an odor with mechanical shock, flies homozygous for one natural allelic variant of this gene (for(R)) showed better short-term but poorer long-term memory than flies homozygous for another natural allele (for(s)). The for(s) allele is characterized by reduced PKG activity. We showed that for(R)-like levels of both short-term learning and long-term memory can be induced in for(s) flies by selectively increasing the level of PKG in the mushroom bodies, which are centers of olfactory learning in the fly brain. Thus, the natural polymorphism at for may mediate an evolutionary tradeoff between short- and long-term memory. The respective strengths of learning performance of the two genotypes seem coadapted with their effects on foraging behavior: for(R) flies move more between food patches and so could particularly benefit from fast learning, whereas for(s) flies are more sedentary, which should favor good long-term memory.}, address = {Department of Biology, University of Fribourg, Chemin du Mus\'{e}e 10, CH 1700 Fribourg, Switzerland; Laboratory for Evolution, Genome and Speciation, Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, Avenue de la Terrasse, F 91198 Gif sur Yvette, France.}, author = {Mery, Frederic and Belay, Amsale T T. and So, Anthony K-C K. and Sokolowski, Marla B B. and Kawecki, Tadeusz J J.}, citeulike-article-id = {1474644}, citeulike-linkout-0 = {http://dx.doi.org/10.1073/pnas.0702923104}, citeulike-linkout-1 = {http://view.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17640898}, citeulike-linkout-2 = {http://www.hubmed.org/display.cgi?uids=17640898}, day = {19}, doi = {10.1073/pnas.0702923104}, issn = {0027-8424}, journal = {Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A}, keywords = {drosophila, memory}, month = {July}, posted-at = {2007-07-23 12:33:44}, priority = {0}, title = {Natural polymorphism affecting learning and memory in Drosophila.}, url = {http://dx.doi.org/10.1073/pnas.0702923104}, year = {2007} }

TY - JOUR ID - citeulike:1474644 L3 - citeulike-article-id:1474644 N2 - Knowing which genes contribute to natural variation in learning and memory would help us understand how differences in these cognitive traits evolve among populations and species. We show that a natural polymorphism at the foraging (for) locus, which encodes a cGMP-dependent protein kinase (PKG), affects associative olfactory learning in Drosophila melanogaster. In an assay that tests the ability to associate an odor with mechanical shock, flies homozygous for one natural allelic variant of this gene (for(R)) showed better short-term but poorer long-term memory than flies homozygous for another natural allele (for(s)). The for(s) allele is characterized by reduced PKG activity. We showed that for(R)-like levels of both short-term learning and long-term memory can be induced in for(s) flies by selectively increasing the level of PKG in the mushroom bodies, which are centers of olfactory learning in the fly brain. Thus, the natural polymorphism at for may mediate an evolutionary tradeoff between short- and long-term memory. The respective strengths of learning performance of the two genotypes seem coadapted with their effects on foraging behavior: for(R) flies move more between food patches and so could particularly benefit from fast learning, whereas for(s) flies are more sedentary, which should favor good long-term memory. JF - Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A SN - 0027-8424 AD - Department of Biology, University of Fribourg, Chemin du Musée 10, CH 1700 Fribourg, Switzerland; Laboratory for Evolution, Genome and Speciation, Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, Avenue de la Terrasse, F 91198 Gif sur Yvette, France. TI - Natural polymorphism affecting learning and memory in Drosophila. KW - drosophila KW - memory AU - Mery, Frederic AU - Belay, Amsale T AU - So, Anthony K-C AU - Sokolowski, Marla B AU - Kawecki, Tadeusz J PY - 2007/07/19/ UR - http://dx.doi.org/10.1073/pnas.0702923104 ER -