help button home button Genetics Drug Metabolism
HOME HELP FEEDBACK SUBSCRIPTIONS ARCHIVE SEARCH TABLE OF CONTENTS
Genetics, Vol. 178, 1895-1902, April 2008, Copyright © 2008
doi:10.1534/genetics.107.084582

This Article
Right arrow Full Text
Right arrow Full Text (PDF)
Right arrow Alert me when this article is cited
Right arrow Alert me if a correction is posted
Services
Right arrow Similar articles in this journal
Right arrow Similar articles in PubMed
Right arrow Alert me to new issues of the journal
Right arrow Download to citation manager
Right arrow reprints & permissions
Google Scholar
Right arrow Articles by LaFerriere, H.
Right arrow Articles by Zars, T.
PubMed
Right arrow PubMed Citation
Right arrow Articles by LaFerriere, H.
Right arrow Articles by Zars, T.

Genetic Dissociation of Ethanol Sensitivity and Memory Formation in Drosophila melanogaster

Holly LaFerriere*, Douglas J. Guarnieri{dagger},1, Divya Sitaraman*, Soeren Diegelmann*,2, Ulrike Heberlein{dagger} and Troy Zars*,3

* Division of Biological Sciences, University of Missouri, Columbia, Missouri 65211 and {dagger} Department of Anatomy, University of California, San Francisco, California 94143-2324

3 Corresponding author: 114 Lefevre Hall, Division of Biological Sciences, University of Missouri, Columbia, MO 65211.
E-mail: zarst{at}missouri.edu

The ad hoc genetic correlation between ethanol sensitivity and learning mechanisms in Drosophila could overemphasize a common process supporting both behaviors. To challenge directly the hypothesis that these mechanisms are singular, we examined the learning phenotypes of 10 new strains. Five of these have increased ethanol sensitivity, and the other 5 do not. We tested place and olfactory memory in each of these lines and found two new learning mutations. In one case, altering the tribbles gene, flies have a significantly reduced place memory, elevated olfactory memory, and normal ethanol response. In the second case, mutation of a gene we name ethanol sensitive with low memory (elm), place memory was not altered, olfactory memory was sharply reduced, and sensitivity to ethanol was increased. In sum, however, we found no overall correlation between ethanol sensitivity and place memory in the 10 lines tested. Furthermore, there was a weak but nonsignificant correlation between ethanol sensitivity and olfactory learning. Thus, mutations that alter learning and sensitivity to ethanol can occur independently of each other and this implies that the set of genes important for both ethanol sensitivity and learning is likely a subset of the genes important for either process.






HOME HELP FEEDBACK SUBSCRIPTIONS ARCHIVE SEARCH TABLE OF CONTENTS
Copyright © 2008 by the Genetics Society of America.