Department of Genetics, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA 02115, USA.
Curr Biol. 2013 Oct 7;23(19):1874-83. doi: 10.1016/j.cub.2013.07.056. Epub 2013 Sep 12.
Surface populations of Astyanax mexicanus, living in rivers like their common ancestors, school, while several, independently derived cave populations of the same species have lost schooling behavior.
We quantify schooling behavior in individual A. mexicanus and identify quantitative trait loci (QTL) for this trait. We find that the evolutionary modulation of schooling has both vision-dependent and -independent components. We also quantify differences in the lateral line and vision between cavefish and surface fish and relate these differences to the evolutionary loss of schooling behavior. We provide evidence that a monoamine neurotransmitter may have played a role in the evolution of schooling behavior.
We find that vision is essential for schooling tendency in A. mexicanus, while the lateral line has a small effect on this behavior. Schooling behavior in A. mexicanus has evolved both through changes in sensory systems and through changes in genetic loci that likely act downstream of sensory inputs.
生活在与共同祖先相似的河流中的墨西哥脂鲤的表面种群具有群体游动行为，而同一物种的几个独立衍生的洞穴种群则失去了群体游动行为。
我们量化了个体墨西哥脂鲤的群体游动行为，并确定了该性状的数量性状基因座 (QTL)。我们发现，群体游动的进化调节既有依赖视觉的成分，也有不依赖视觉的成分。我们还量化了洞穴鱼和表面鱼之间的侧线和视觉差异，并将这些差异与群体游动行为的进化丧失联系起来。我们提供的证据表明，单胺类神经递质可能在群体游动行为的进化中发挥了作用。
我们发现，在墨西哥脂鲤中，视觉对于群体游动倾向是必不可少的，而侧线对这种行为的影响较小。墨西哥脂鲤的群体游动行为是通过感觉系统的变化以及可能作用于感觉输入下游的遗传基因座的变化而进化的。
