Drosophila as a Model Organism for the Study of Neuropsychiatric Disorders

Abstract

The fruitfly Drosophila offers a model system in which powerful genetic tools can be applied to understanding the neurobiological bases of a range of complex behaviors. The Drosophila and human lineages diverged several hundred million years ago, and despite their obvious differences, flies and humans share many fundamental cellular and neurobiological processes. The similarities include fundamental mechanisms of neuronal signaling, a conserved underlying brain architecture and the main classes of neurotransmitter system. Drosophila also have a sophisticated behavioral repertoire that includes extensive abilities to adapt to experience and other circumstances, and is therefore susceptible to the same kinds of insults that can cause neuropsychiatric disorders in humans. Given the different physiologies, lifestyles, and cognitive abilities of flies and humans, many higher order behavioral features of the human disorders cannot be modeled readily in flies. However, an increasing understanding of the genetics of human neuropsychiatric disorders is suggesting parallels with underlying neurobiological mechanisms in flies, thus providing important insights into the possible mechanisms of these poorly understood disorders.

Effects of midazolam, pentobarbital and ketamine on the mRNA expression of ion channels in a model organism Daphnia pulex

“…These simple animals share many complex traits with mammals, even at behavioral levels [36]. Furthermore, the major groups of ion channels are conserved, simplifying the dissection of core molecular machinery responsible for drug addiction.…”

“…In addition, simple animals, such as C. elegans and Drosophila , share many complex traits with mammals, even at behavioral levels [36]. Therefore, the use of invertebrate model organisms may greatly simplify the dissection of core molecular machinery responsible for drug actions and addiction.…”

Genetic Manipulation of Genes and Cells in the Nervous System of the Fruit Fly

“…Drosophila research has contributed to our understanding of nervous system development (Doe, 2008;Hartenstein et al, 2008), growth cone guidance and target recognition (Dickson, 2002), exocytosis and endocytosis at synapses (Bellen et al, 2010), synapse remodeling (Collins and Diantonio, 2007), and the neural circuitry underlying behaviors such as courtship (Villella and Hall, 2008), diurnal rhythms and sleep (Crocker and Sehgal, 2010), aggression (Kravitz and Huber, 2003), and learning and memory (McGuire et al, 2005). Moreover, it is now obvious that Drosophila is a good model organism to study genes that are involved in human disease, especially neurodegenerative mechanisms associated with Alzheimer disease, Parkinson disease, polyglutamine and other triplet repeat expansion diseases, amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, or neurological disorders such as epilepsy, depression and schizophrenia (Lu and Vogel, 2009;Lessing and Bonini, 2009;O'Kane, 2011). The toolkit is so extensive that it is becoming difficult to assess which tool is most appropriate for a particular application.…”

Psychomotor Behavior: A Practical Approach in Drosophila

“…Indeed, previous studies have shown that 714 distinct human disease genes match 548 unique Drosophila sequences (6). Moreover, some of the genes that have been implicated in the pathogenesis of psychiatric diseases have counterparts in the Drosophila genome (7, 8). Taken together, these findings suggest that there may be an opportunity to study neuropsychiatric disorders in fruit flies.…”