Neuropeptide F regulates courtship in Drosophila through a male-specific neuronal circuit
- University of California, Santa Barbara, United States
- Zhejiang University, China
Abstract
Male courtship is provoked by perception of a potential mate. In addition, the likelihood and intensity of courtship are influenced by recent mating experience, which affects sexual drive. Using Drosophila melanogaster, we found that the homolog of mammalian neuropeptide Y, neuropeptide F (NPF), and a cluster of male-specific NPF (NPFM) neurons, regulate courtship through affecting courtship drive. Disrupting NPF signaling produces sexually hyperactive males, which are resistant to sexual satiation, and whose courtship is triggered by sub-optimal stimuli. We found that NPFM neurons make synaptic connections with P1 neurons, which comprise the courtship decision center. Activation of P1 neurons elevates NPFM neuronal activity, which then act through NPF receptor neurons to suppress male courtship, and maintain the proper level of male courtship drive.
Data availability
All data generated or analysed during this study are included in the manuscript and supporting files.
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Author details
Funding
National Institute on Deafness and Other Communication Disorders (DC007864)
- Craig Montell
National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (DP1AI124453)
- Craig Montell
The funders had no role in study design, data collection and interpretation, or the decision to submit the work for publication.
Copyright
© 2019, Liu et al.
This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License permitting unrestricted use and redistribution provided that the original author and source are credited.
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Neuropeptide F regulates courtship in Drosophila through a male-specific neuronal circuit
eLife 8:e49574.
https://doi.org/10.7554/eLife.49574
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