Dankert Heiko, Wang Liming, Hoopfer Eric D, Anderson David J, Perona Pietro
Howard Hughes Medical Institute, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, USA.
Nat Methods. 2009 Apr;6(4):297-303. doi: 10.1038/nmeth.1310. Epub 2009 Mar 8.
We introduce a method based on machine vision for automatically measuring aggression and courtship in Drosophila melanogaster. The genetic and neural circuit bases of these innate social behaviors are poorly understood. High-throughput behavioral screening in this genetically tractable model organism is a potentially powerful approach, but it is currently very laborious. Our system monitors interacting pairs of flies and computes their location, orientation and wing posture. These features are used for detecting behaviors exhibited during aggression and courtship. Among these, wing threat, lunging and tussling are specific to aggression; circling, wing extension (courtship 'song') and copulation are specific to courtship; locomotion and chasing are common to both. Ethograms may be constructed automatically from these measurements, saving considerable time and effort. This technology should enable large-scale screens for genes and neural circuits controlling courtship and aggression.
我们介绍了一种基于机器视觉的方法，用于自动测量黑腹果蝇的攻击行为和求偶行为。目前，对于这些先天性社会行为的遗传和神经回路基础，我们了解得还很少。在这种具有遗传易处理性的模式生物中进行高通量行为筛选是一种潜在的强大方法，但目前非常费力。我们的系统会监测相互作用的果蝇对，并计算它们的位置、方向和翅膀姿态。这些特征用于检测攻击行为和求偶行为中表现出的行为。其中，翅膀威胁、猛冲和扭打是攻击行为所特有的；盘旋、翅膀伸展（求偶“歌声”）和交配是求偶行为所特有的；移动和追逐则是两者共有的。可以根据这些测量结果自动构建行为图谱，从而节省大量时间和精力。这项技术应该能够对控制求偶和攻击行为的基因和神经回路进行大规模筛选。
