Neural Circuits underlying Innate Odor Preference in Drosophila

描述(申请人提供)：有关外部世界的信息通过感觉系统到达我们的大脑。感觉刺激与外周的感受器神经元相互作用，产生感觉。中央电路对周围神经活动的解释导致了对外部世界的感知。动物感官世界的哪些特征与行为有关？重要的感觉线索是如何在中央大脑中被处理以产生适当的行为输出的？这项建议侧重于在初级和次级感觉处理中心水平上研究天生吸引和厌恶气味的神经表征，以努力在简单的模式生物体中发现编码负价或正价的硬连接神经回路。拟议的实验将在果蝇身上进行，这是一种在解剖学上具有简单嗅觉系统的有机体，可以接受分子和遗传操作、光学成像技术和行为分析。这里概述的实验研究了这样一种假设，即天生吸引和厌恶的气味是由不同的标记线电路编码的。这些实验的目标是：1)在触角叶水平上确定关键的电路元件，触角叶是嗅觉的主要感觉处理中心，它介导对嗅觉刺激的吸引或厌恶；2)检查吸引和厌恶气味在更高的大脑中枢，如蘑菇体的表现。然后，这些发现将成为启动一个长期项目的平台，该项目针对高级大脑中心的嗅觉和决策，将价格分配给在环境中遇到的刺激，以获得适当的动机行为。 公共卫生相关性：药物成瘾通过奖赏信号的神经回路对感官知觉产生深远的影响。这项提议的工作是一门基础科学，旨在揭示嗅觉背后的神经回路，创建一个知识库，从这个知识库中可以评估潜在的神经元群体，用于未来的药物成瘾治疗干预。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Information about the external world arrives at our brain via sensory system. Sensory stimuli interact with receptor neurons in the periphery to generate sensation. Interpretation of the peripheral neural activity by the central circuitry leads to perception of the external world. What features of an animal's sensory world are relevant to behavior? How are the important sensory cues processed in the central brain to generate appropriate behavioral output? This proposal focuses on studying the neural representation of innately attractive and aversive odorants at the level of both primary and secondary sensory processing centers in an effort to uncover hard wired neural circuits that encode negative or positive valence in a simple model organism. The proposed experiments will be carried out in Drosophila, an organism with an anatomically simple olfactory system that is amenable to molecular and genetic manipulations, optical imaging technologies, and behavioral analysis. The experiments outlined here investigate the hypothesis that innately attractive and aversive odorants are encoded by separate labeled-line circuits. The goals of these experiments are: 1) to define key circuit elements at the level of the antennal lobe, a primary sensory processing center for olfaction, that mediate attraction or aversion to olfactory stimuli; 2) to examine the representation of attractive and aversive odorants at higher brain center such as the mushroom body. These findings would then serve as a platform for launching a longer-term project directed at olfactory perception and decision- making at higher brain centers, where valence is assigned to stimuli encountered in the environment for appropriate motivated behaviors. PUBLIC HEALTH RELEVANCE: Drug addiction through neural circuit of reward signal has a profound impact on sensory perception. The work of this proposal is basic science that seeks to reveal the neural circuit underlying olfactory perception, creating a knowledge base from which potential neuron population can be evaluated for future therapeutic interventions of drug addiction.