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. 2010 Jul-Sep;4(3):216-25.
doi: 10.4161/fly.4.3.12280. Epub 2010 Jul 1.

An assay for social interaction in Drosophila fragile X mutants

Francois V Bolduc  1 , Dan Valente, Antoinette T Nguyen, Partha P Mitra, Tim Tully
Affiliations

An assay for social interaction in Drosophila fragile X mutants

Francois V Bolduc et al. Fly (Austin). 2010 Jul-Sep.

Abstract

We developed a novel assay to examine social interactions in Drosophila and, as a first attempt, apply it here at examining the behavior of Drosophila Fragile X Mental Retardation gene (dfmr1) mutants. Fragile X syndrome is the most common cause of single gene intellectual disability (ID) and is frequently associated with autism. Our results suggest that dfmr1 mutants are less active than wild-type flies and interact with each other less often. In addition, mutants for one allele of dfmr1, dfmr1(B55), are more likely to come in close contact with a wild-type fly than another dfmr1(B55) mutant. Our results raise the possibility of defective social expression with preserved receptive abilities. We further suggest that the assay may be applied in a general strategy of examining endophenoypes of complex human neurological disorders in Drosophila, and specifically in order to understand the genetic basis of social interaction defects linked with ID.

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Figures

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Figure 1A and B. Pair-wise Fragile X mutant dfmr1B55 social behavior differs from wild-type. (A and B) Joint spatial distributions p(x,y) for wild-type (A) and dfmr1B55 flies (B). A single fly is placed in each chamber for each test, and the experiment is performed for N pairs of flies (N = 7 pairs for WT and N = 9 pairs for dfmr1B55). The small chamber is designated as Chamber 1 (C1) and the long chamber is designated as Chamber 2 (C2). The divider between boundaries is at y = 0 cm.
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Figure 1C–H. Pair-wise Fragile X mutant dfmr1B55 behavior differs from wild-type. (C and D) Marginal probability distribution p(y) of wild-type (C) and dfmr1B55 (d) flies in Cl. (E and F) Marginal distribution of wild-type (E) and dfmr1B5 (F) flies in C2. (G and H) Interfly distance distribution p(d) for wild-type (G) and dfmr1B55 (H) flies.
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Figure 2. Pair-wise Fragile X dfmr1 mutant social behavior. (A and B) Joint spatial distributions p(x,y) with a dfmr1 mutant in each chamber or with wild-type fly in C1 and a dfmr1 fly in C2 (B). (C and D) Marginal probability distribution p(y) of dfmr1 mutant (C) and wild-type (D) in C1. (E and F) Marginal distribution of dfmr1 mutant in C2 when exposed to wild-type (E) or mutant dfmr1 (f) in C1. (G and H) Interfly distance distribution p(d) when dfmr1 are exposed to dfmr1 (G) or wild-type flies (H). N = 10 pairs for dfmr1-dfmr1 and N = 10 pairs for dfmr1-wild-type.
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Figure 3. Modification of dfmr1B55 mutant social behavior. (A and B) Joint spatial distributions p(x,y) with a dfmr1B5 mutant in each chamber or with wild-type fly in C1 and a dfmr1B5 fly in C2 (B). (C and D) Marginal probability distribution p(y) of dfmr1B5 mutant (C) and wild-type (D) in C1. (E and F) Marginal distribution of dfmr1B5 mutant in C2 when exposed to wild-type (E) or mutant dfmr1B5 (F) in C1. (G and H) Interfly distance distribution p(d) when dfmr1B5 are exposed to dfmr1B5 (G) or wild-type flies (H). N = 9 pairs for dfmr1B5-dfmr1B5 and N = 10 pairs for dfmr1B5-wild-type.
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Figure 4. Fragile X mutant behavior modification is influenced by behavior of both flies involved. (A) Tukey box-plots of the average fractional time spent by flies in chamber 1 at the top of the chamber for each genotype pair. In this plot, and all subsequent boxplots, the + symbols are outlier points, defined as having values greater than 1.5 times the interquartile range from the ends of the box. The dfmr1B5-dfmr1B5 and dfmr1B5-C2: dfmr1B5 groups are identical genotype pairs, but were tested on separate days and are presented as separate groups in the plots. dfmr1B5/dfmr1B5 correspond to the data in Figure 1, whereas dfmr1B5/C2: dfmr1B5 correspond to the data in Figure 3. (B) Average fractional time spent by fly in chamber 1 at the bottom of the chamber for each genotype pair. (C) Average fractional time spent by fly in chamber 2 at top of the chamber for each genotype pair. (D) Average fractional time spent by fly in chamber 2 at the bottom of the chamber for each genotype pair. (E) Average fractional time spent at an interfly distance less than 5 mm for each genotype pair. (F) Number of crossings of an imaginary line at various distances from the wall dividing chamber 1 and chamber 2 for each genotype. Statistical comparison summary for (A–E) is shown in Table 1.
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