Beyond the response—High throughput behavioral analyses to link genome to phenome in Caenorhabditis elegans

• Published in: Genes, brain and behavior brain and behavior, 2018-03, Vol.17 (3), p.e12437-n/a
• Main Authors: McDiarmid, T. A., Yu, A. J., Rankin, C. H.
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Automation; Behavioral genetics; Caenorhabditis elegans; Genomes; habituation; high throughput behavioral analysis; Learning; machine vision; Memory; Nematodes; non‐associative learning; optogenetics; phenomics; worm tracker; Worms
• ISSN: 1601-1848; 1601-183X
• DOI: 10.1111/gbb.12437

An illustration of classic manual stop‐framed video analysis of a simple behavior—the Caenorhabditis elegans tap withdrawal response. A, A single C. elegans worm crawling on agar in a petri plate. A push solenoid (bottom left) delivers a mechanosensory tap stimulus that vibrates the agar, causing the worm to reverse. The probability and distance of the reversal response is manually scored by tracing the trajectory of the worm on to acetate sheets using stop‐framed video analysis. B, With repeated stimulation the probability of the response habituates (observed as a gradually learned response decrement). Error bars denote SEM. The development and application of methods for automated behavioral analysis have revolutionized behavioral genetics across model organisms. In this review we summarize the history of automated behavioral analysis in the nematode Caenorhabditis elegans. We highlight recent studies of learning and memory to exemplify just how complex the genetic and neural circuit mechanisms underlying a seemingly simple single behavioral response can be. We finish by looking forward at the exciting prospects of combing genomic technologies with connectomic and phenomic level measurements.