Unknown

Dataset Information

0

Accelerated food source location in aging Drosophila.


ABSTRACT: Adequate energy stores are essential for survival, and sophisticated neuroendocrine mechanisms evolved to stimulate foraging in response to nutrient deprivation. Food search behavior is usually investigated in young animals, and it is not known how aging alters this behavior. To address this question in Drosophila melanogaster, we compared the ability to locate food by olfaction in young and old flies using a food-filled trap. As aging is associated with a decline in motor functions, learning, and memory, we expected that aged flies would take longer to enter the food trap than their young counterparts. Surprisingly, old flies located food with significantly shorter latency than young ones. Robust food search behavior was associated with significantly lower fat reserves and lower starvation resistance in old flies. Food-finding latency (FFL) was shortened in young wild-type flies that were starved until their fat was depleted but also in heterozygous chico mutants with reduced insulin receptor activity and higher fat deposits. Conversely, food trap entry was delayed in old flies with increased insulin signaling. Our results suggest that the difference in FFL between young and old flies is linked to age-dependent differences in metabolic status and may be mediated by reduced insulin signaling.

SUBMITTER: Egenriether SM 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4568979 | biostudies-literature | 2015 Oct

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

altmetric image

Publications

Accelerated food source location in aging Drosophila.

Egenriether Sada M SM   Chow Eileen S ES   Krauth Nathalie N   Giebultowicz Jadwiga M JM  

Aging cell 20150623 5


Adequate energy stores are essential for survival, and sophisticated neuroendocrine mechanisms evolved to stimulate foraging in response to nutrient deprivation. Food search behavior is usually investigated in young animals, and it is not known how aging alters this behavior. To address this question in Drosophila melanogaster, we compared the ability to locate food by olfaction in young and old flies using a food-filled trap. As aging is associated with a decline in motor functions, learning, a  ...[more]

Similar Datasets

| S-EPMC4135498 | biostudies-literature
| S-EPMC3658962 | biostudies-literature
| S-EPMC7218124 | biostudies-literature
| S-EPMC9479496 | biostudies-literature
| S-EPMC4406678 | biostudies-literature
| S-EPMC7407029 | biostudies-literature
| S-EPMC5425119 | biostudies-literature
| S-EPMC6707774 | biostudies-literature
| S-EPMC6683044 | biostudies-literature
| S-EPMC1175968 | biostudies-literature