Relating past and present diet to phenotypic and transcriptomic variation in the fruit fly

Abstract

BackgroundSub-optimal developmental diets often have adverse effects on long-term fitness and health. One hypothesis is that such effects are caused by mismatches between the developmental and adult environment, and may be mediated by persistent changes in gene expression. However, there are few experimental tests of this hypothesis. Here we address this using the fruit fly, Drosophila melanogaster. We vary diet during development and adulthood in a fully factorial design and assess the consequences for both adult life history traits and gene expression at middle and old age.ResultsWe find no evidence that mismatches between developmental and adult diet are detrimental to either lifespan or fecundity. Rather, developmental and adult diet exert largely independent effects on both lifespan and gene expression, with adult diet having considerably more influence on both traits. Furthermore, we find effects of developmental diet on the transcriptome that persist into middle and old-age. Most of the genes affected show no correlation with the observed phenotypic effects of larval diet on lifespan. However, in each sex we identify a cluster of ribosome, transcription, and translation-related genes whose expression is altered across the lifespan and negatively correlated with lifespan.ConclusionsAs several recent studies have linked decreased expression of ribosomal and transcription related proteins to increased lifespan, these provide promising candidates for mediating the effects of larval diet on lifespan. We place our findings in the context of theories linking developmental conditions to late-life phenotypes and discuss the likelihood that gene expression differences caused by developmental exposure causally relate to adult ageing phenotypes.Electronic supplementary materialThe online version of this article (doi:10.1186/s12864-017-3968-z) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

Age-Dependent Modulations of Resting State Connectivity Following Motor Practice

“…Among other regions, these networks include both inter- and intra-hemispheric connections between the supplementary motor area (SMA), the premotor cortex (PM), and the primary motor cortex (M1) ( Donchin et al, 1998 ; Byblow et al, 2007 ; O’Shea et al, 2007 ; Talelli et al, 2008 ; Hinder et al, 2011 ). However, a reduced motor plasticity with progressing age may be responsible for the observed deficits in consolidation processes ( Todd et al, 2010 ; Freitas et al, 2011 ; May and Zwaan, 2017 ).…”

Pervasive gene expression responses to a fluctuating diet inDrosophila melanogaster: The importance of measuring multiple traits to decouple potential mediators of life span and reproduction

“…; Doroszuk et al. ; May & Zwaan ). We argue that when only measuring a single trait, the genes that mediate other unmeasured covarying traits will likely be associated with this trait, resulting in many false positives.…”

“…; Dorosozuk et al., ; Whitaker et al. ; May & Zwaan ). Furthermore, the two time points were necessary to be able to compare the Yl and Yh treatment flies properly (i.e., to correct for initial diet and potential time effects).…”

Role of Critical Size on Adult life History Traits in Drosophila Melanogaster.

“…In D. melanogaster, environmental conditions during larval life are suggested to affect its adult size 19 and their physiology 19,20 which in turn affect various life-history traits 1,3,[21][22][23][24] . Further, if the larval nutritional environment or developmental diet is rich then they tend to emerge with larger adult body size and attain reproductive maturity at an early age that has a positive implication on tness 11,25,26 . In general though not universal 18 "bigger is better" idea prevails with larvae spending more time in weight (equal to resource/energy) gain under good nourishment conditions, eventually emerging as larger adults with higher tness.…”

“…In general though not universal 18 "bigger is better" idea prevails with larvae spending more time in weight (equal to resource/energy) gain under good nourishment conditions, eventually emerging as larger adults with higher tness. Also 'silver spoon hypothesis 25 ' posits that individuals born in good conditions have tness or performance advantages in later life with many examples 25 and those born in poor conditions are at a permanent disadvantage 27 . Varying the quality or quantity of diet during developmental in D. melanogaster affects adult body size and its associated life history hence it is known to serve as a tractable model to study dietary manipulation during pre-adult and adult stages 24,28,29 .…”