Dopaminergic neurons are preferentially responsive to advertisement calls and co-active with social behavior network nuclei in sneaker male midshipman fish.

Dopaminergic neurons are preferentially responsive to advertisement calls and co-active with social behavior network nuclei in sneaker male midshipman fish. Brain Res. 2018 Sep 11;: Authors: Ghahramani ZN, Timothy M, Varughese J, Sisneros JA, Forlano PM Abstract Vocal species use acoustic signals to facilitate diverse behaviors such as mate attraction and territorial defense. However, little is known regarding the neural substrates that interpret such divergent conspecific signals. Using the plainfin midshipman fish model, we tested whether specific catecholaminergic (i.e., dopaminergic and noradrenergic) nuclei and nodes of the social behavior network (SBN) are differentially responsive following exposure to playbacks of divergent social signals in sneaker males. We chose sneaker (type II) males since they attempt to steal fertilizations from territorial type I males who use an advertisement call (hum) to attract females yet are also subjected to vocal agonistic behavior (grunts) by type I males. We demonstrate that induction of cFos (an immediate early gene product and proxy for neural activation) in two forebrain dopaminergic nuclei is greater in sneaker males exposed to hums but not grunts compared to ambient noise, suggesting hums preferentially activate these nuclei, further asserting dopamine as an important regulator of social-acoustic behaviors. Moreover, acoustic exposure to social signals with divergent salience engendered...
Source: Brain Research - Category: Neurology Authors: Tags: Brain Res Source Type: research