IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/nat/nature/v472y2011i7343d10.1038_nature09821.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Catecholamine receptor polymorphisms affect decision-making in C. elegans

Author

Listed:
  • Andres Bendesky

    (Howard Hughes Medical Institute, Laboratory of Neural Circuits and Behavior, The Rockefeller University)

  • Makoto Tsunozaki

    (Howard Hughes Medical Institute, Laboratory of Neural Circuits and Behavior, The Rockefeller University)

  • Matthew V. Rockman

    (New York University)

  • Leonid Kruglyak

    (Howard Hughes Medical Institute, Carl Icahn Laboratory, Princeton University)

  • Cornelia I. Bargmann

    (Howard Hughes Medical Institute, Laboratory of Neural Circuits and Behavior, The Rockefeller University)

Abstract

Innate behaviours are flexible: they change rapidly in response to transient environmental conditions, and are modified slowly by changes in the genome. A classical flexible behaviour is the exploration–exploitation decision, which describes the time at which foraging animals choose to abandon a depleting food supply. We have used quantitative genetic analysis to examine the decision to leave a food patch in Caenorhabditis elegans. Here we show that patch-leaving is a multigenic trait regulated in part by naturally occurring non-coding polymorphisms in tyra-3 (tyramine receptor 3), which encodes a G-protein-coupled catecholamine receptor related to vertebrate adrenergic receptors. tyra-3 acts in sensory neurons that detect environmental cues, suggesting that the internal catecholamines detected by tyra-3 regulate responses to external conditions. These results indicate that genetic variation and environmental cues converge on common circuits to regulate behaviour, and suggest that catecholamines have an ancient role in regulating behavioural decisions.

Suggested Citation

  • Andres Bendesky & Makoto Tsunozaki & Matthew V. Rockman & Leonid Kruglyak & Cornelia I. Bargmann, 2011. "Catecholamine receptor polymorphisms affect decision-making in C. elegans," Nature, Nature, vol. 472(7343), pages 313-318, April.
    • Handle: RePEc:nat:nature:v:472:y:2011:i:7343:d:10.1038_nature09821
    DOI: 10.1038/nature09821
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.nature.com/articles/nature09821
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1038/nature09821?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:nat:nature:v:472:y:2011:i:7343:d:10.1038_nature09821. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.nature.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.