Transcriptome Analysis of Drosophila Mushroom Body Neurons by Cell Type Reveals Memory-Related Changes in Gene Expression

We report the application of low cell number sequencing of identifiable Drosophila melanogaster neurons following behavior. We demonstate the feasibility of identifying the transcriptome of 5 Mushroom Body output Neurons and 2 classes of Kenyon Cells. We find these neurons display a diverse repertoire of receptors and signaling transcripts. This information alone seems to be enough to identify each class of neurons in the study. In additional we show that aversive long-term memory induces changes in gene transcript levels in a subset of these neurons. This study provides a framework for identifying neuronal classes in Drosophila melanogaster and gaining insight into the interplay between behavior and gene regulation. Overall design: 5 Mushroom Body output neurons and 2 classes of kenyon cells are used to look at general gene expression and changes following aversive long term memory. Paired control and trained animals were used and a minimum of 4 pairs up to 6 pairs. Animals were of the same background (w1118). Animals were aged and parental matched. Cells were harvested at the same chronological time for the animals across all experiments. All animals were exposed to 1 minute of each odor and 1 minute of a series of 12 5second 60V shocks. This was considered one block and then the animals had spaced training of each block so there was a 10 minute break between 8 blocks of training. Trained animals had an odor paired with a shock, control animals received the shock then the odor stimulus. All cells were harvested usign a patch pipet from living animals on an electrophysiology rig within a half hour of the end of training. Cells were amplified using the Clontech SMARTer Ultra Low Input RNA version 2 High Volume kit. 2 Brain samples were also collected and 3-4 whole fly samples for each genotype were collected to account for background differences across flies.

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Crocker A, Guan XJ, Murphy CT, Murthy M