A neuropeptide screen to identify modulators of behavioral alterations induced by confinement

Abstract

The relevance of the word “confinement” and the negative effects it has on physical, mental, and emotional wellbeing has become particularly evident to humanity during the COVID-19 pandemic, when mandatory or fear-induced self-confinements were highly effective in reducing viral spread, but they also severely disrupted human behavior. The molecular and neural mechanisms underlying the translation of physical confinement to internal state changes and how these alter behavior are poorly understood and very difficult to study in natural settings due to an excessive number of possible confounding factors. Innate behaviors, which are complex, genetically-encoded behaviors that proceed with a predictable sequence, provide a unique window to study the effects of confinement on behavior. We used the wing expansion behavior that Drosophila juveniles perform upon eclosing from their puparium to unravel both the molecular and cellular correlates of behaviorally-relevant, confinementinduced changes in internal states. Newly emerged flies select a suitable place to perch and initiate a stereotyped behavior that leads to the expansion of the folded wings. The execution of this behavior, which is triggered by the hormone Bursicon, is strongly negatively-regulated by spatial confinement. Placement of flies in small chambers extends the perch selection phase, but the environmental cues, neural circuits and molecular mechanism that mediate this decision remain unknown. Here, we describe our experimental setup and present the preliminary results of our pan neuronal RNAi silencing screen devised to test the requirement of neuropeptides and neurotransmitters in this behavioral choice.