Amazing stuff!
"In a breakthrough study, scientists have transferred a courtship behavior from one species to another, triggering the recipient to perform this completely foreign act as if it was its own. While genes have been swapped between species to influence traits, a totally unknown behavior has never been genetically swapped into a different animal before. ..."
"Researchers in Japan have genetically transferred a unique courtship behavior from one fruit fly species to another. By turning on a single gene in insulin-producing neurons, the team successfully made a species of fruit fly (Drosophila melanogaster) perform a gift-giving ritual it had never done before. The study ... represents the first example of manipulating a single gene to create new neural connections and transfer behavior between species. ..."
From the editor's summary and abstract:
"Editor’s summary
In the fruit fly Drosophila subobscura, courtship behavior includes nuptial gift giving, in which the male feeds the female a regurgitated food gift. The same behavior is not observed in related species, including the common lab animal D. melanogaster.
Tanaka et al. studied the genetics of nuptial gift giving in male animals and showed that expression of the gene FruitlessM (FruM) in insulin-like peptide-producing cells (IPCs) was both necessary and sufficient for triggering this behavior in D. subobscura.
Overexpression of FruM in D. melanogaster IPCs induced neurite outgrowth in these cells and increased regurgitation behavior. These results unveil the genetic and neuronal basis of an evolutionary important species-specific behavior. ...
Abstract
In accepting a courting male, Drosophila subobscura females require nuptial gift giving in which a male gives regurgitated crop contents to her mouth to mouth. No similar behavior is found in D. melanogaster.
By clonal activation of neurons expressing the male-determinant FruM, we identified insulin-like peptide–producing cells (IPCs) and their putative postsynaptic targets, proboscis-innervating motoneurons, as those critical for gift giving.
We demonstrate that loss of FruM from D. subobscura IPCs abrogates neurite extension and gift giving, whereas FruM overexpression in their D. melanogaster counterparts induces overgrowth of neurites that harbor functional synapses, culminating in increased regurgitation.
We suggest that the acquisition of FruM expression by IPCs was a key event occurring in an ancestral D. subobscura that conferred a latent capability to perform nuptial gift giving."
First transfer of behavior between species through single gene manipulation (original press release)
Scientists have successfully transferred gift-giving courtship behavior from Drosophila subobscura to D. melanogaster males. They genetically engineered insulin-producing neurons in D. melanogaster to produce FruM proteins, causing these cells to grow long neural projections and connect to the courtship center in the brain.
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