Agonistic behavior and electrical stimulation of the antennae induces Fos‐like protein expression in the male cricket brain

Ghosal, Kaushik; Naples, Scott P.; Rabe, Alexander; Killian, Kathleen A.

doi:10.1002/arch.20360

Cited by 10 publications

(9 citation statements)

References 34 publications

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“…Agonistic behaviour is known to enhance neurogenesis [71] and cFOS expression in the brain of male Acheta domesticus [72], while Gryllus integer males raised in the absence of the conspecific song are claimed to become more aggressive when adult [73]. It thus seems possible that long term changes in population density may have subtle influences on aggression that escape detection with the observation methods employed by us.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Isolation Associated Aggression – A Consequence of Recovery from Defeat in a Territorial Animal

Stevenson

Rillich

2013

PLoS ONE

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Population density has profound influences on the physiology and behaviour of many animal species. Social isolation is generally reported to lead to increased aggressiveness, while grouping lowers it. We evaluated the effects of varying degrees of isolation and grouping on aggression in a territorial insect, the Mediterranean field cricket, Gryllus bimaculatus . Substantiating early observations, we show that dyadic contests between weight-matched, adult male crickets taken from groups rarely escalate beyond threat displays, whereas interactions between pairs of previously isolated crickets typically escalate to physical fights lasting several seconds. No significant differences were found between 1, 2 and 6-day isolates, or between individuals grouped for a few hours or lifelong. Unexpectedly, crickets grouped in immediate proximity within individual mesh cages that precluded fighting while permitting visual, olfactory and mechanical, antennal contact, were as aggressive as free isolates. This suggests that reduced aggression of grouped animals may be an acquired result of fighting. Supporting this notion, isolated crickets initially engage in vigorous fights when first grouped, but fighting intensity and duration rapidly decline to the level of life-long grouped crickets within only 10 min. Furthermore, grouped crickets become as aggressive as life-long isolates after only 3 hours of isolation, and on the same time course required for crickets to regain their aggressiveness after social defeat. We conclude that the reduced aggressiveness of grouped crickets is a manifestation of the loser effect resulting from social subjugation, while isolation allows recovery to a state of heightened aggressiveness, which in crickets can be considered as the default condition. Given the widespread occurrence of the loser effect in the Animal Kingdom, many effects generally attributed to social isolation are likely to be a consequence of recovery from social subjugation.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Isolation Associated Aggression – A Consequence of Recovery from Defeat in a Territorial Animal

Stevenson

Rillich

2013

PLoS ONE

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“…Finally, on a topic we have brushed past, aggression can have longer-term changes on the operation of the nervous system than those discussed here. Agonistic behavior can trigger neurogenesis (Ghosal et al, 2009) and FOS-like protein expression in the male cricket brain (Ghosal et al, 2010), but it is not know whether this leads to changes in behavior. A hint of the complexities involved is given by the finding that aggressive behavior in Drosophila is affected by over 50 novel genes with widespread pleiotropic effects (Edwards et al, 2009).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Decision to Fight or Flee – Insights into Underlying Mechanism in Crickets

Stevenson¹,

Rillich²

2012

Front. Neurosci.

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Ritualized fighting between conspecifics is an inherently dangerous behavioral strategy, optimized to secure limited resources at minimal cost and risk. To be adaptive, potential rewards, and costs of aggression must be assessed to decide when it would be more opportune to fight or flee. We summarize insights into the proximate mechanisms underlying this decision-making process in field crickets. As in other animals, cricket aggression is enhanced dramatically by motor activity, winning, and the possession of resources. Pharmacological manipulations provide evidence that these cases of experience dependent enhancement of aggression are each mediated by octopamine, the invertebrate counterpart to adrenaline/noradrenaline. The data suggest that both physical exertion and rewarding aspects of experiences can activate the octopaminergic system, which increases the propensity to fight. Octopamine thus represents the motivational component of aggression in insects. For the decision to flee, animals are thought to assess information from agonistic signals exchanged during fighting. Cricket fights conform to the cumulative assessment model, in that they persist in fighting until the sum of their opponent’s actions accumulates to some threshold at which they withdraw. We discuss evidence that serotonin, nitric oxide, and some neuropeptides may promote an insect’s tendency to flee. We propose that the decision to fight or flee in crickets is controlled simply by relative behavioral thresholds. Rewarding experiences increase the propensity to fight to a level determined by the modulatory action of octopamine. The animal will then flee only when the accumulated sum of the opponent’s actions surpasses this level; serotonin and nitric oxide may be involved in this process. This concept is in line with the roles proposed for noradrenaline, serotonin, and nitric oxide in mammals and suggests that basic mechanisms of aggressive modulation may be conserved in phylogeny.

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“…Egr-1 expression is induced in the hippocampus of rodents engaged in spatial learning tasks (Bozon et al, 2002). Recent investigation of IEG activity in insects has yielded growing evidence for activityand learning-related expression similar to that in vertebrates (Alaux and Robinson, 2007;Ghosal et al, 2010;Kiya and Kubo, 2011;Kiya et al, 2008;Sen Sarma et al, 2010). However, the insect homolog of Egr-1, here named Egr, has mainly been studied for its role in muscle development (Volk, 1999), though it has been shown to be upregulated in the brains of flies after seizure, suggesting that it may also be induced by neuronal activity (Guan et al, 2005).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Activity-dependent gene expression in honey bee mushroom bodies in response to orientation flight

Lutz

Robinson

2013

Journal of Experimental Biology

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SUMMARYThe natural history of adult worker honey bees (Apis mellifera) provides an opportunity to study the molecular basis of learning in an ecological context. Foragers must learn to navigate between the hive and floral locations that may be up to miles away. Young pre-foragers prepare for this task by performing orientation flights near the hive, during which they begin to learn navigational cues such as the appearance of the hive, the position of landmarks, and the movement of the sun. Despite welldescribed spatial learning and navigation behavior, there is currently limited information on the neural basis of insect spatial learning. We found that Egr, an insect homolog of Egr-1, is rapidly and transiently upregulated in the mushroom bodies in response to orientation. This result is the first example of an Egr-1 homolog acting as a learning-related immediate-early gene in an insect and also demonstrates that honey bee orientation uses a molecular mechanism that is known to be involved in many other forms of learning. This transcriptional response occurred both in naïve bees and in foragers induced to re-orient. Further experiments suggest that visual environmental novelty, rather than exercise or memorization of specific visual cues, acts as the stimulus for Egr upregulation. Our results implicate the mushroom bodies in spatial learning and emphasize the deep conservation of Egr-related pathways in experience-dependent plasticity.

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Agonistic behavior and electrical stimulation of the antennae induces Fos‐like protein expression in the male cricket brain

Cited by 10 publications

References 34 publications

Isolation Associated Aggression – A Consequence of Recovery from Defeat in a Territorial Animal

Isolation Associated Aggression – A Consequence of Recovery from Defeat in a Territorial Animal

The Decision to Fight or Flee – Insights into Underlying Mechanism in Crickets

Activity-dependent gene expression in honey bee mushroom bodies in response to orientation flight

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