Regulators of Long-Term Memory Revealed by Mushroom Body-Specific Gene Expression Profiling in Drosophila melanogaster

Genetics: A Periodical Record of Investigations Bearing on Heredity and Variation

Yves F. Widmer^1¹  Adem Bilican^2² 

[1] Department of Biology, University of Fribourg, CH-1700, Switzerland^1;Interfaculty Bioinformatics Unit, University of Bern, CH-3012, Switzerland^2

关键词: learning;    long-term memory;    Drosophila melanogaster;    targeted DamID;    transcriptome;   

DOI  :  10.1534/genetics.118.301106

学科分类：医学（综合）

来源: Genetics Society of America

【 摘 要 】

Memory formation is achieved by genetically tightly controlled molecular pathways that result in a change of synaptic strength and synapse organization. While for short-term memory traces, rapidly acting biochemical pathways are in place, the formation of long-lasting memories requires changes in the transcriptional program of a cell. Although many genes involved in learning and memory formation have been identified, little is known about the genetic mechanisms required for changing the transcriptional program during different phases of long-term memory (LTM) formation. With Drosophila melanogaster as a model system, we profiled transcriptomic changes in the mushroom body—a memory center in the fly brain—at distinct time intervals during appetitive olfactory LTM formation using the targeted DamID technique. We describe the gene expression profiles during these phases and tested 33 selected candidate genes for deficits in LTM formation using RNAi knockdown. We identified 10 genes that enhance or decrease memory when knocked-down in the mushroom body. For vajk-1 and hacd1the two strongest hits—we gained further support for their crucial role in appetitive learning and forgetting. These findings show that profiling gene expression changes in specific cell-types harboring memory traces provides a powerful entry point to identify new genes involved in learning and memory. The presented transcriptomic data may further be used as resource to study genes acting at different memory phases.

【 授权许可】

CC BY