Interplay between aggression, brain monoamines and fur color mutation in the American mink

Abstract

Domestication of wild animals alters the aggression towards humans, brain monoamines and coat pigmentation. Our aim is the interplay between aggression, brain monoamines and depigmentation. The Hedlund white mutation in the American mink is an extreme case of depigmentation observed in domesticated animals. The aggressive (-2.06 ± 0.03) and tame (+3.5 ± 0.1) populations of wild-type dark brown color (standard) minks were bred during 17 successive generations for aggressive or tame reaction towards humans, respectively. The Hedlund mutation was transferred to the aggressive and tame backgrounds to generate aggressive (-1.2 ± 0.1) and tame (+3.0 ± 0.2) Hedlund minks. Four groups of 10 males with equal expression of aggressive (-2) or tame (+5) behavior, standard or with the Hedlund mutation, were selected to study biogenic amines in the brain. Decreased levels of noradrenaline in the hypothalamus, but increased concentrations of the serotonin metabolite, 5-hydroxyindoleacetic acid and dopamine metabolite, homovanillic acid, in the striatum were measured in the tame compared with the aggressive standard minks. The Hedlund mutation increased noradrenaline level in the hypothalamus and substantia nigra, serotonin level in the substantia nigra and striatum and decreased dopamine concentration in the hypothalamus and striatum. Significant interaction effects were found between the Hedlund mutation and aggressive behavior on serotonin metabolism in the substantia nigra (P < 0.001), dopamine level in the midbrain (P < 0.01) and its metabolism in the striatum (P < 0.05). These results provide the first experimental evidence of the interplay between aggression, brain monoamines and the Hedlund mutation in the American minks.

Masculinity and the mechanisms of human self-domestication

“…Results from long-running experiments using captive silver foxes (Vulpes vulpes) demonstrate that sustained breeding selection against aggressive stress reactivity provokes a range of unselected domestication-typical traits ('domestication syndrome') within a given lineage (Trut, 1999;Trut et al, 2009). Similar effects are documented in mink (Kharlamova et al, 2000;Kulikov et al, 2016), in rats (Albert et al, 2008;Singh et al, 2017), in chickens (Agnvall et al, 2017;Jensen, 2006), and in semi-domesticated mice (Geiger, Sánchez-Villagra, & Lindholm, 2018). Rather than repeated random mutation of genes controlling each commonly altered feature across multiple domesticated lineages and taxa, many domesticated traits are proposed to result from shared developmental shifts (Belyaev, 1979;Fallahsharoudi et al, 2015;Osadchuk, 1998;Trut et al, 2009).…”

Characterization of POU2F1 Gene and Its Potential Impact on the Expression of Genes Involved in Fur Color Formation in Rex Rabbit

“…The formation of fur color in mammals is a complex process influenced by diverse factors, including the environment, management, and the genetic background [2,3]. Briefly, the relative quantity and distribution of melanocyte products, such as eumelanin and pheomelanin, determine the fur color [4,5].…”

Natural Selection Equally Supports the Human Tendencies in Subordination and Domination: A Genome-Wide Study With in silico Confirmation and in vivo Validation in Mice

“…In animals, such intraspecies hierarchy is a result of agonistic aggressive behavior defined by ethologists as an innate form of action to protect oneself, shelter, progeny, and territory (Lorenz, 2002). Artificial selection of animals for either aggressiveness (Kulikov et al, 2016) or domestication (Belyaev, 1979) has demonstrated the contribution of genetic factors to the phenotypic manifestation of aggressiveness (Ehrman and Parsons, 1981; Moore, 2013). Finally, a genome-wide search for genetic factors of both fear and aggressive behaviors has been conducted on model animals, e.g., in canines, which were artificially selected for both domestication and agonistic behavior (Zapata et al, 2016).…”