Electrical synapses mediate synergism between pheromone and food odors in Drosophila melanogaster

Abstract

In , the sex pheromone produced by males,-vaccenyl acetate (cVA), evokes a stereotypic gender-specific behavior in both males and females. As adults feed, mate, and oviposit on food, they perceive the pheromone as a blend against a background of food odors. Previous studies have reported that food odors enhance flies' behavioral response to cVA, specifically in virgin females. However, how and where the different olfactory inputs interact has so far remained unknown. In this study, we elucidated the neuronal mechanism underlying the response at an anatomical, functional, and behavioral level. Our data show that in virgin females cVA and the complex food odor vinegar evoke a synergistic response in the cVA-responsive glomerulus DA1. This synergism, however, does not appear at the input level of the glomerulus, but is restricted to the projection neuron level only. Notably, it is abolished by a mutation in gap junctions in projection neurons and is found to be mediated by electrical synapses between excitatory local interneurons and projection neurons. As a behavioral consequence, we demonstrate that virgin females in the presence of vinegar become receptive more rapidly to courting males, while male courtship is not affected. Altogether, our results suggest that lateral excitation via gap junctions modulates odor tuning in the antennal lobe and drives synergistic interactions between two ecologically relevant odors, representing food and sex.

Alcohol boosts pheromone production in male flies and makes them sexier

“…The responses to the alcohols were observed in OSN type ab1A (Or42b) with a stronger affinity to ethanol, and in ab2A (Or59b) and pb1A (Or42a) with stronger responses towards methanol. We also noted a synergy between ethanol exposure and at1A response to cVA (which has been demonstrated previously 6,20,21 ), as well as a possible synergy between at4A responses towards methanol exposure and ML ( Supplementary Figure 5d,e), although neither alcohol directly activated these trichoid associated OSNs when presented alone. At the OSN level, we did not observe any variation in SSR response based on mating status (mated vs. non-mated males) (Figure 3d).…”

“…This is similar to ecologically relevant concentrations of CO 2 , where two neural pathways are weighed against each other in order to control behavioral valence 7 . Crosstalk has also been shown to occur between information regarding different types of odorants 20,27,28 , and may play a larger role in physiological state-dependent coding, as well as in determining feeding and oviposition preferences across the Drosophila genus, for example, in divergent preferences for different stages of host fermentation [29][30][31] .…”

The depletion of ubiquilin in Drosophila melanogaster disturbs neurochemical regulation to drive activity and behavioral deficits

“…(2020) 10:5689 | https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-020-62520-ywww.nature.com/scientificreports www.nature.com/scientificreports/ The perturbation of courtship behavior was observed in dUbqn-depleted flies. Drosophila has complex behaviors that are regulated by dopamine and serotonin such as feeding, locomotion, and courtship behaviors40,41,43,44 . From LC-MS/MS data, we also found reductions in dopamine and serotonin levels under…”

The Scent of the Fly

“…The response to food and mate olfactory cues is strongly interconnected in Drosophila (Das et al 2017;Gorter et al 2016;Lebreton et al 2015) and DmelOr69a is also tuned to the newly identified female pheromone (Z)-4-undecenal (Z4-11Al), in addition to food odorants (Lebreton et al 2017). Curiously, Z4-11Al is also found in citrus essential oil (Chisholm et al 2003).…”