The nature of Drosophila melanogaster

Reaume, Christopher J.; Sokolowski, Marla B.

doi:10.1016/j.cub.2006.07.042

Cited by 70 publications

(58 citation statements)

References 21 publications

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“…In the case of D. melanogaster larvae, learning associations between odours and food rewards may be of primary importance for guiding their foraging decisions in the dark (Schleyer et al, 2015). Within a single rotting fruit, the stochastic nature of colonisation by bacteria and fungi may lead to considerable spatio-temporal variation of nutrient distribution, providing patchy and ephemeral foraging environments (Reaume and Sokolowski, 2006). Olfactory learning may therefore be useful for larvae to accurately navigate between patches of nutritious substrates interspaced with non-nutritious areas free of microbes.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…At the most simplistic level, females must find a suitable breeding site for the development of the juveniles (Royle et al, 2012). In species in which animals lay eggs in food resources, such as fruit flies, the challenge for the females is to trade off between choosing food substrates maximising their own nutrition and providing a high-quality nutritional environment for the development of their offspring (Reaume and Sokolowski, 2006). Because fruit fly larvae have limited mobility, their nutrition is largely determined by the mother's choice of oviposition site, making egg-laying decisions crucial for the survival of embryos and larvae.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Drosophila females trade off good nutrition with high quality oviposition sites when choosing foods

Lihoreau

Poissonnier

Isabel

et al. 2016

Journal of Experimental Biology

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Animals, from insects to humans, select foods to regulate their acquisition of key nutrients in amounts and balances that maximise fitness. In species in which the nutrition of juveniles depends on parents, adults must make challenging foraging decisions that simultaneously address their own nutrient needs as well as those of their progeny. Here, we examined how the fruit fly Drosophila melanogaster, a species in which individuals eat and lay eggs in decaying fruits, integrate feeding decisions (individual nutrition) and oviposition decisions (offspring nutrition) when foraging. Using cafeteria assays with artificial diets varying in concentrations and ratios of protein to carbohydrates, we show that D. melanogaster females exhibit complex foraging patterns, alternating between laying eggs on high carbohydrate foods and feeding on foods with different nutrient contents depending on their own nutritional state. Although larvae showed faster development on high protein foods, both survival and learning performance were higher on balanced foods. We suggest that the apparent mismatch between the oviposition preference of females for high carbohydrate foods and the high performances of larvae on balanced foods reflects a natural situation where high carbohydrate ripened fruits gradually enrich in proteinaceous yeast as they start rotting, thereby yielding optimal nutrition for the developing larvae. Our findings that animals with rudimentary parental care uncouple feeding and egg-laying decisions in order to balance their own diet and provide a nutritionally optimal environment to their progeny reveal unsuspected levels of complexity in the nutritional ecology of parent-offspring interactions.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Drosophila females trade off good nutrition with high quality oviposition sites when choosing foods

Lihoreau

Poissonnier

Isabel

et al. 2016

Journal of Experimental Biology

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“…In nature, D. melanogaster lives, feeds, and breeds in the same place (Reaume & Sokolowski, 2006), so the ability to adapt to a new diet is important. D. melanogaster can detect the nutritional quality of a particular food and induce an adaptive plastic response .…”

Section: Original Articlementioning

confidence: 99%

Fitness traits of Drosophila melanogaster (Diptera: Drosophilidae) after long-term laboratory rearing on different diets

Trajković¹,

Vujić²,

Miličić³

et al. 2017

Eur. J. Entomol.

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Abstract. Nutrition is one of the most important environmental factors that infl uence the development and growth in Drosophila. The food composition strongly affects their reproduction, welfare and survival, so it is necessary for fl ies to search for a mixture of macronutrients that maximizes their fi tness. We have fi ve D. melanogaster strains, which were reared for 13 years on fi ve different substrates: standard cornmeal-agar-sugar-yeast medium and four substrates modifi ed by adding tomato, banana, carrot and apple. This study was aimed at determining how such long-term rearing of fl ies on substrates with different protein content affects fi tness traits (dynamics of eclosion, developmental time and egg-to-adult survival). Further, we determined how transferring fl ies reared on fruit/vegetable substrates to a standard laboratory diet affected their fi tness. Results indicate that strains reared on the diet with the lowest content of protein and the highest C/N ratio had the slowest eclosion and developmental time, and lowest egg-to-adult survival (apple diet). The fl ies reared on the diet with the highest protein content and the lowest C/N ratio had the highest survival (tomato diet). Flies reared on the carrot diet, which is quite similar in protein content and C/N ratio to the standard cornmeal diet, had the fastest development. Transferring fl ies to the standard cornmeal diet accelerate eclosion and developmental time, but did not affect survival.

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“…These tests have been used for decades to assess exploratory behavior in many species (34,35), as well as in D. melanogaster more recently (36)(37)(38)(39). Walking exploration is an ecologically valid measure because flies spend a considerable amount of time walking on fruits and other substrates in search of food, mates, and oviposition sites (40,41).…”

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confidence: 99%

Gene–environment interplay inDrosophila melanogaster: Chronic food deprivation in early life affects adult exploratory and fitness traits

Burns

Svetec

Rowe

et al. 2012

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

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Early life adversity has known impacts on adult health and behavior, yet little is known about the gene-environment interactions (GEIs) that underlie these consequences. We used the fruit fly Drosophila melanogaster to show that chronic early nutritional adversity interacts with rover and sitter allelic variants of foraging (for) to affect adult exploratory behavior, a phenotype that is critical for foraging, and reproductive fitness. Chronic nutritional adversity during adulthood did not affect rover or sitter adult exploratory behavior; however, early nutritional adversity in the larval period increased sitter but not rover adult exploratory behavior. Increasing for gene expression in the mushroom bodies, an important center of integration in the fly brain, changed the amount of exploratory behavior exhibited by sitter adults when they did not experience early nutritional adversity but had no effect in sitters that experienced early nutritional adversity. Manipulation of the larval nutritional environment also affected adult reproductive output of sitters but not rovers, indicating GEIs on fitness itself. The natural for variants are an excellent model to examine how GEIs underlie the biological embedding of early experience.genotype-environment interaction | plasticity T he question of how individual differences arise is fundamental to biology, psychology, and precision medicine (1, 2). From studies on mammals, we know that early adversity places individuals on developmental trajectories for health and behavior that can last a lifetime (3, 4). However, for the most part, this idea has not been investigated in simple model genetic organisms, such as the worm Caenorhabditis elegans or the fruit fly Drosophila melanogaster, in which gene manipulation can be readily accomplished. Two biological mechanisms that can underlie individual differences, and that go beyond the obsolete notion of nature or nurture, are gene-environment interactions (GEIs) and epigenetics. Here, we explore GEIs in the context of early adversity. In particular, we address how early adversity interacts with natural variants of the foraging (for) gene to affect adult behavior and fitness in D. melanogaster.Within human populations, nutritional adversity can lead to substantive effects on cognitive and behavioral development (5, 6). The question of how early adversities perturb normal development is a difficult one, because both the strength and timing of adversity can matter. For example, in humans, detrimental effects are seen after chronic protein or carbohydrate deprivation, yet one or a few acute deprivations have little long-term effect (7). Similarly, in fruit flies, levels of hemolymph carbohydrate affected by 3 h of food deprivation return to normal levels after just 2 h of refeeding (8). Moreover, not all individuals are affected equally by early nutritional adversity (9, 10), and these individual differences arise from GEIs.In evolutionary biology, GEIs can be important for the maintenance and expression of both phenotypic plasticit...

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The nature of Drosophila melanogaster

Cited by 70 publications

References 21 publications

Drosophila females trade off good nutrition with high quality oviposition sites when choosing foods

Drosophila females trade off good nutrition with high quality oviposition sites when choosing foods

Fitness traits of Drosophila melanogaster (Diptera: Drosophilidae) after long-term laboratory rearing on different diets

Gene–environment interplay inDrosophila melanogaster: Chronic food deprivation in early life affects adult exploratory and fitness traits

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