Nava Saúl S, An Stephen, Hamil Tyler
Department of Biology and the Center for the Integrative Study of Animal Behavior, Indiana University, Bloomington, IN, USA.
J Vis. 2011 May 4;11(6):2. doi: 10.1167/11.6.2.
Visual sensitivity to ultraviolet (UV) light is widespread in the animal kingdom. Many studies on UV vision have utilized physiological and/or anatomical methods to determine whether animals are visually sensitive to UV wavelengths. However, ultimately behavioral methods can reveal whether retinal UV sensitivity results in perceptual detection of UV stimuli. For the widely studied zebrafish (Danio rerio), the adult retina possesses cone photoreceptors that are sensitive to UV light. Here, we used a behavioral technique, the escape response assay, to test whether adult zebrafish can visually detect and behaviorally respond to visual cues that reflect UV. We found that adult zebrafish robustly respond to UV reflecting cues under UV light while showing no responses to the same cues under no UV light. From our results, we confirm that adult zebrafish can visually detect UV reflecting cues and show that UV perceptual sensitivity is functional in adult zebrafish. Our study highlights the utility of the fish escape response assay for UV visual behavior research.
对紫外线（UV）的视觉敏感性在动物界广泛存在。许多关于紫外线视觉的研究利用生理和/或解剖学方法来确定动物是否对紫外线波长具有视觉敏感性。然而，最终行为方法能够揭示视网膜对紫外线的敏感性是否会导致对紫外线刺激的感知检测。对于广泛研究的斑马鱼（Danio rerio），成年斑马鱼的视网膜拥有对紫外线敏感的视锥光感受器。在这里，我们使用一种行为技术，即逃避反应测定法，来测试成年斑马鱼是否能够视觉检测到并对反射紫外线的视觉线索做出行为反应。我们发现成年斑马鱼在紫外线照射下对反射紫外线的线索有强烈反应，而在无紫外线条件下对相同线索无反应。从我们的结果来看，我们证实成年斑马鱼能够视觉检测到反射紫外线的线索，并表明紫外线感知敏感性在成年斑马鱼中是起作用的。我们的研究突出了鱼类逃避反应测定法在紫外线视觉行为研究中的实用性。
