A neuronal ensemble encoding adaptive choice during sensory conflict in Drosophila

Feeding decisions are fundamental to survival, and decision making is often disrupted in disease. Here, we show that neural activity in a small population of neurons projecting to the fan-shaped body higher-order central brain region of Drosophila represents food choice during sensory conflict. We f...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Nature communications 2021-07, Vol.12 (1), p.4131-4131, Article 4131
Main Authors: Sareen, Preeti F., McCurdy, Li Yan, Nitabach, Michael N.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
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Animals
Brain - metabolism
Decision Making
Dietary restrictions
Dopamine receptors
Drosophila
Drosophila - metabolism
Drosophila melanogaster - metabolism
Drosophila Proteins - metabolism
Feeding Behavior - physiology
Food
Food Preferences
Food sources
Fruit flies
Humanities and Social Sciences
Hunger
Hunger - physiology
Insects
multidisciplinary
Neurons
Neurons - metabolism
Science
Science (multidisciplinary)
Taste
Taste - physiology
Taste Perception
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Summary:Feeding decisions are fundamental to survival, and decision making is often disrupted in disease. Here, we show that neural activity in a small population of neurons projecting to the fan-shaped body higher-order central brain region of Drosophila represents food choice during sensory conflict. We found that food deprived flies made tradeoffs between appetitive and aversive values of food. We identified an upstream neuropeptidergic and dopaminergic network that relays internal state and other decision-relevant information to a specific subset of fan-shaped body neurons. These neurons were strongly inhibited by the taste of the rejected food choice, suggesting that they encode behavioral food choice. Our findings reveal that fan-shaped body taste responses to food choices are determined not only by taste quality, but also by previous experience (including choice outcome) and hunger state, which are integrated in the fan-shaped body to encode the decision before relay to downstream motor circuits for behavioral implementation. The valence of information about food sources can be conflicting. Here, the authors show that activity in a small population of neurons projecting to the fan-shaped body of Drosophila represents food choice during sensory conflict.
ISSN:2041-1723
2041-1723
DOI:10.1038/s41467-021-24423-y