Saltz Julia B, Lymer Seana, Gabrielian Jessica, Nuzhdin Sergey V
Am Nat. 2017 Jul;190(1):61-72. doi: 10.1086/692010. Epub 2017 Apr 24.
Correlations among traits, including behaviors, are important because traits that are genetically correlated may not evolve independently. Recently, behavioral-correlations research has expanded to include correlations not only in mean-level behaviors but also in behavioral plasticity, that is, the degree to which individuals change their behavior in response to environmental stimuli. Positive correlations among behavioral plasticities would imply that individuals or genotypes that are behaviorally plastic in one way may also be plastic in other ways; negative correlations could imply trade-offs. Here, we examine aversive odor conditioning (learning) at two time points and plasticity in pupation site selection behavior across substrates in a panel of Drosophila genotypes. These behaviors represent different types of behavioral plasticity: contextual plasticity describes behavioral responses to stimuli that are currently present, while developmental plasticity describes behavioral responses to remembered experiences with stimuli in the recent past. We find that learning scores and plasticity in pupation site selection behavior are positively genetically correlated, representing the first example of a genetic correlation between developmental and contextual plasticity. These findings imply that ecological and evolutionary theories focusing on variation in a single dimension of behavioral plasticity may be incomplete.
包括行为在内的性状之间的相关性很重要，因为具有遗传相关性的性状可能不会独立进化。最近，行为相关性研究已经扩展到不仅包括平均水平行为的相关性，还包括行为可塑性的相关性，也就是说，个体根据环境刺激改变其行为的程度。行为可塑性之间的正相关意味着在一种方式上具有行为可塑性的个体或基因型在其他方式上也可能具有可塑性；负相关可能意味着权衡。在这里，我们在两个时间点研究了厌恶气味条件作用（学习），并在一组果蝇基因型中研究了化蛹地点选择行为在不同底物间的可塑性。这些行为代表了不同类型的行为可塑性：情境可塑性描述了对当前存在的刺激的行为反应，而发育可塑性描述了对近期记忆中的刺激经历的行为反应。我们发现学习分数与化蛹地点选择行为的可塑性存在正遗传相关性，这是发育可塑性与情境可塑性之间遗传相关性的首个例子。这些发现意味着专注于行为可塑性单一维度变化的生态和进化理论可能是不完整的。
