A novel assay to evaluate action selection in escape behavior

作者：Goodman David P; Eldredge Abby; von Reyn Catherine R^*

来源：Journal of Neuroscience Methods, 2018, 304: 154-161.

DOI：10.1016/j.jneumeth.2018.04.019

• Action selection
• Behavioral assay
• Escape behavior
• Drosophila melanogaster
• Sensorimotor
• Neural circuits

Background: How experience and individuality shape action selection remains a major question in neuroscience. Visually-evoked escape behavior within Drosophila melanogaster provides a robust model to study these mechanisms within neural circuits but requires novel assays to circumvent limitations of current behavior assays.
Method: Here we describe and characterize a simple, low to moderate cost, and flexible assay for studying visually-evoked escape responses in tethered flies. This assay consists of a DLP projector, cylindrical rear projection screen, and an automated flight interruption motor all controlled within a MATLAB environment.
Results: We find this assay effectively recapitulates fly behaviors previously observed in free behavior assays, and provides a novel opportunity to investigate the behavior of individual flies over the course of numerous stimulus presentations.
Comparison to existing methods: Current Drosophila escape assays do not permit multiple stimulus pre-sentations and can be highly complex and expensive to implement.
Conclusions: This assay provides an effective system to further identify neural components and mechanisms underlying action selection within parallel sensorimotor pathways.

• 出版日期2018-7-1