Open AccessControl of Sleep by Dopaminergic Inputs to the Drosophila Mushroom Body
Author(s) -
Divya Sitaraman,
Yoshinori Aso,
Gerald M. Rubin,
Michael N. Nitabach
Publication year - 2015
Publication title -
frontiers in neural circuits
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 2.036
H-Index - 61
ISSN - 1662-5110
DOI - 10.3389/fncir.2015.00073
Subject(s) - mushroom bodies , neuroscience , dopaminergic , glutamatergic , sleep (system call) , cholinergic , biology , psychology , dopamine , drosophila melanogaster , gene , glutamate receptor , computer science , genetics , receptor , operating system
The Drosophila mushroom body (MB) is an associative learning network that is important for the control of sleep. We have recently identified particular intrinsic MB Kenyon cell (KC) classes that regulate sleep through synaptic activation of particular MB output neurons (MBONs) whose axons convey sleep control signals out of the MB to downstream target regions. Specifically, we found that sleep-promoting KCs increase sleep by preferentially activating cholinergic sleep-promoting MBONs, while wake-promoting KCs decrease sleep by preferentially activating glutamatergic wake-promoting MBONs. Here we use a combination of genetic and physiological approaches to identify wake-promoting dopaminergic neurons (DANs) that innervate the MB, and show that they activate wake-promoting MBONs. These studies reveal a dopaminergic sleep control mechanism that likely operates by modulation of KC-MBON microcircuits.