Drosophila as a Model Organism
Drosophila as a Model Organism
The fruitfly Drosophila offers a model system in which powerful genetic tools can be applied to understanding the neurobiological bases of a range of complex behaviors. The Drosophila and human lineages diverged several hundred million years ago, and despite their obvious differences, flies and humans share many fundamental cellular and neurobiological processes. The similarities include fundamental mechanisms of neuronal signaling, conserved underlying brain architecture and the main classes of neurotransmitter system. Drosophila also has a sophisticated behavioral repertoire that includes extensive abilities to adapt to experience and other circumstances, and is, therefore, susceptible to the same kinds of insults that can cause neuropsychiatric disorders in humans. Given the different physiologies, lifestyles, and cognitive abilities of flies and humans
Abbreviations
ARM Anesthesia-resistant memoryBBB Blood-brain barrier
cAMP Cyclic AMP DAT Dopamine transporter
GABA Gamma-aminobutyric acid
LNs Lateral neurons
NMJ Neuromuscular junction
NPF Neuropeptide F
NPY Neuropeptide Y
PACAP Pituitary adenylate cyclase-activating protein
PKA cAMP-dependent protein kinase
SERT Serotonin transporter
SSRI Selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor
VMAT Vesicular monoamine transporter
Structure and Analysis of Eukaryotic Genes
Introduction
Given the complexity and sophistication of behavioral phenotypes in neuropsychiatric disorders, can an apparently much simpler organism such as Drosophila make a useful contribution to our understanding of these disorders? At a number of levels from behavioral to molecular, the answer is certainly yes
The Architecture of the Drosophila Brain and Its Neurotransmitter Systems
The Fly Brain
Before looking at fly behavior and what can go wrong with it, how is the Drosophila brain that mediates this behavior built? The basic building blocks of the brain, neurons, and glia, are found in both flies and mammals. Neurons show almost all the functional and molecular features of mammalian neurons: axons with their transport machinery, pumps, and voltage-gated channels that underlie action potential transmission, presynaptic terminals with all the machinery for synaptic vesicle release and recycling, dendrites, postsynapses with localized receptor fields and active zones
What is centrifuge
Neurotransmitter Systems
The similarities between fly and human nervous systems extend also to the main neurotransmitter systems and channels (Littleton and Ganetzky 2000), which are the targets of many pharmacological interventions relevant to neuropsychiatric conditions. Acetylcholine is the main excitatory neurotransmitter in the Drosophila central nervous system (CNS), in contrast to the more limited role in the mammalian CNS. Like mammals, flies also have choline acetyltransferase
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Drosophila as a Model Organism AbbreviationsARM Anesthesia-resistant memoryBBB Blood-brain barriercAMP Cyclic AMP DAT Dopamine transporterGABA
