Gargano Julia Warner, Martin Ian, Bhandari Poonam, Grotewiel Michael S
Department of Zoology, Michigan State University, East Lansing, MI 48824, USA.
Exp Gerontol. 2005 May;40(5):386-95. doi: 10.1016/j.exger.2005.02.005. Epub 2005 Mar 19.
Age-related behavioral declines are common manifestations of aging in animals. Negative geotaxis, an innate escape response during which flies ascend the wall of a cylinder after being tapped to its bottom, is one of the behaviors that senesces in Drosophila. Many laboratories, including ours, have used a variety of negative geotaxis assays based on the performance of single flies. To circumvent limitations of single-fly assays, we developed a new method for assessing negative geotaxis called rapid iterative negative geotaxis (RING). In RING assays, digital photography is used to document negative geotaxis in multiple groups of animals simultaneously. We show that performance in RING assays is not influenced by the density of flies being tested, the time of day, or repeated testing. We used the RING assay to demonstrate that negative geotaxis declines with the age of animals as previously shown in single fly studies and that senescence of negative geotaxis is sensitive to genetic background. Finally, we used RING assays to show that long-lived Indy and chico mutants exhibit delayed senescence of negative geotaxis. Our results demonstrate that RING is a powerful method for assessing negative geotaxis that should facilitate the search for manipulations that influence behavioral aging in Drosophila.
与年龄相关的行为衰退是动物衰老的常见表现。负趋地性是一种先天的逃避反应，果蝇被轻拍到圆筒底部后会沿筒壁向上攀爬，这是果蝇衰老过程中出现衰退的行为之一。包括我们实验室在内的许多实验室，都基于单只果蝇的表现使用了多种负趋地性检测方法。为了规避单只果蝇检测方法的局限性，我们开发了一种名为快速迭代负趋地性（RING）的新方法来评估负趋地性。在RING检测中，数码摄影用于同时记录多组动物的负趋地性表现。我们发现，RING检测的结果不受受试果蝇密度、时间或重复检测的影响。我们利用RING检测证明，负趋地性会随动物年龄增长而衰退，正如之前在单只果蝇研究中所显示的那样，并且负趋地性的衰老对遗传背景敏感。最后，我们利用RING检测表明，长寿的Indy和chico突变体表现出负趋地性衰老延迟。我们的结果表明，RING是一种评估负趋地性的有力方法，应有助于寻找影响果蝇行为衰老的调控方式。
