MIRA: The biological basis of paternal care in stickleback fish

项目摘要/摘要 父母的照顾对父母和子女的健康都是至关重要的，但人们对其分子机制知之甚少 底物作用于大脑区域和神经元回路，以改变父母的行为，这种差距尤其明显 广泛用于父亲的照顾，即父亲的照顾行为。这项拟议的研究充分利用了自然 在单一物种(三刺刺鱼)中父性照顾的差异，以揭示生物学基础 在脊椎动物中的父性关怀。目前的父亲照料模式是双亲照料，这使得 很难理清父母的行为。三刺刺鱼是一种很有前途的新鱼 这是父性照料的典范，因为父亲完全负责提供照料。此外，分子 与护理相关的机制在脊椎动物中非常保守，刺鱼基因组小而紧凑 而且有越来越多的实用工具可以用来研究它们。这项提议的目标是 定义导致单一物种内父性照顾差异的分子元素以及 描述与这种行为变化有关的神经生物学途径。有两个目标：1) 确定导致父性照料差异的基因，并测试它们的功能；2)确定 神经肽信号调节父亲的照顾。该项目结合了大脑基因表达谱在 大细胞和单细胞水平，病毒介导的转基因实验，以建立机制和 催产素和精氨酸加压素信号的药理作用。拟议的工作提供了一个 通过使用一种强大的新技术来解决解剖父亲护理的生物学基础的挑战的创新解决方案 通过利用单一物种中父性照顾的自然变异，建立了为人父的模式。

PROJECT SUMMARY/ABSTRACT Parental care is critical to the health of both parents and offspring, yet little is known about how molecular substrates act within brain areas and neuronal circuits to alter parental behavior, and this gap is especially wide for paternal care, i.e. the care-giving behavior of fathers. The proposed research capitalizes on natural variation in paternal care within a single species (threespined stickleback fish) to uncover the biological basis of paternal care in vertebrates. The current models for paternal care have biparental care, which makes it difficult to disentangle the behavior of mothers and fathers. Threespined stickleback fish are a promising new model for paternal care because fathers are solely responsible for providing care. Moreover, the molecular mechanisms related to care are deeply conserved in vertebrates, the stickleback genome is small and compact and there are a growing number of functional tools available to study them. The goals of this proposal are to define the molecular elements responsible for differences in paternal care within a single species and to characterize the neurobiological pathways involved in such variation in behavior. There are two objectives: 1) Identify genes that contribute to differences in paternal care and test their function; 2) Define the ways in which neuropeptide signaling regulates paternal care. The project combines brain gene expression profiling at the bulk and single cell level, viral mediated transgenesis experiments to establish mechanism and pharmacological manipulations of oxytocin and arginine vasopressin signaling. The proposed work offers an innovative solution to the challenge of dissecting the biological basis of paternal care by using a powerful new model for fathering, and by capitalizing on natural variation in paternal care within a single species.