Presenter(s): Adeline Fecker
Faculty Mentor(s): Phil Washbourne & Sarah Stednitz
Poster 75
Session: Sciences
Disruption in social behavior is characteristic of Autism Spectrum Disorder, which is a neurodevelopmental disorder that appears in early childhood. Previous papers measured social orienting behavior in zebrafish in a dyad assay and showed lesioning of the ventral forebrain reduced social orienting specifically (Stednitz, 2018). These specific neurons may be evolutionarily conserved and may be found in humans. This study aims to identify other parts of the forebrain that may be implicated in social behavior, to understand which senses contribute to social behavior, and to understand how brain activity patterns relate to sensory conditions and behavior. Measuring behavior in an open field allows us to qualify more complex social behavior like orienting, following and dispersing. The Stednitz (2018) paper suggested subjects must be able to see each other to demonstrate orienting behavior and show activation of the ventral forebrain. However, in an open field, subjects are able to interact without visual stimulus. A deeper investigation into the importance of sensory systems in social behavior can be achieved through olfactory and mechanosensory ablation. Early results suggest the visual system is not required for social interaction, as zebrafish can still follow each other in the dark. Whole brain immunolabeling with pERK and ERK allows for an unbiased approach to identifying important brain regions in social orienting. The neurons in the ventral forebrain (marked “ y321 ” with GFP) acts as our landmark, and our results confirm the importance of the ventral forebrain in social behavior. However, other regions of the forebrain vary in activity in different experimental sensory conditions. Our analysis of behavior and corresponding brain activity will shed light onto more regions that may be implicated in social behavior.