Behavioural responses of the hagfish Eptatretus stoutii to nutrient and noxious stimuli

Abstract

The suitability of a traditional testing paradigm (e.g. choice chamber) for assessing chemosensory behaviour in the Pacific hagfish, Eptatretus stoutii, was examined. Actively-swimming hagfish, tested at night, showed no preference for any region of a T-maze in the absence of a stimulus, but in the presence of an olfactory food cue, spent significantly more time in the zone where the cue was placed. Conversely, hagfish avoided spending time in the zone the fish anaesthetic 3-amino benzoic acid ethylester (MS-222) was placed, and demonstrated significantly more reversal responses in which the fish moved its body backwards. These data suggest that hagfish are an amenable model species for laboratory testing of behaviour.

Consciousness in Jawless Fishes

“…Still, the hagfish appears to have an advantage in behavioral experiments over the lamprey because it will feed in an aquarium. Recently, Glover et al (2019) reported that the chemosensory behavior of the hagfish can be assessed using a modified T-maze arena, in which food or noxious stimuli are placed in one of the arms of the maze. This suggests that hagfish learning behavior can be investigated using food as a reward.…”

The evolutionary origins of the vertebrate olfactory system

“…Adult sea lamprey uses odours from conspecific larvae (including dihydroxylated tetrahydrofuran fatty acids and some bile acids) to select the best streams for spawning based on their larval population [55][56][57][58][59]. Hagfishes are usually found in deep water and their olfactory organ seems particularly efficient as they have been shown to be among the first fish species to locate chemical signals of decaying prey [60,61]. Electrophysiological recordings indicate that their olfactory sensory neurons are particularly sensitive to amino acids [62].…”