Automated monitoring and quantitative analysis of feeding behaviour in Drosophila

Food ingestion is one of the defining behaviours of all animals, but its quantification and analysis remain challenging. This is especially the case for feeding behaviour in small, genetically tractable animals such as Drosophila melanogaster. Here, we present a method based on capacitive measurements, which allows the detailed, automated and high-throughput quantification of feeding behaviour. Using this method, we were able to measure the volume ingested in single sips of an individual, and monitor the absorption of food with high temporal resolution. We demonstrate that flies ingest food by rhythmically extending their proboscis with a frequency that is not modulated by the internal state of the animal. Instead, hunger and satiety homeostatically modulate the microstructure of feeding. These results highlight similarities of food intake regulation between insects, rodents, and humans, pointing to a common strategy in how the nervous systems of different animals control food intake

An Array of Descending Visual Interneurons Encoding Self-Motion in Drosophila

The means by which brains transform sensory information into coherent motor actions is poorly understood. In flies, a relatively small set of descending interneurons are responsible for conveying sensory information and higher-order commands from the brain to motor circuits in the ventral nerve cord. Here, we describe three pairs of genetically identified descending interneurons that integrate information from wide-field visual interneurons and project directly to motor centers controlling flight behavior. We measured the physiological responses of these three cells during flight and found that they respond maximally to visual movement corresponding to rotation around three distinct body axes. After characterizing the tuning properties of an array of nine putative upstream visual interneurons, we show that simple linear combinations of their outputs can predict the responses of the three descending cells. Last, we developed a machine vision-tracking system that allows us to monitor multiple motor systems simultaneously and found that each visual descending interneuron class is correlated with a discrete set of motor programs

Automated monitoring and quantitative analysis of feeding behaviour in Drosophila

Food ingestion is one of the defining behaviours of all animals, but its quantification and analysis remain challenging. This is especially the case for feeding behaviour in small, genetically tractable animals such as Drosophila melanogaster. Here, we present a method based on capacitive measurements, which allows the detailed, automated and high-throughput quantification of feeding behaviour. Using this method, we were able to measure the volume ingested in single sips of an individual, and monitor the absorption of food with high temporal resolution. We demonstrate that flies ingest food by rhythmically extending their proboscis with a frequency that is not modulated by the internal state of the animal. Instead, hunger and satiety homeostatically modulate the microstructure of feeding. These results highlight similarities of food intake regulation between insects, rodents, and humans, pointing to a common strategy in how the nervous systems of different animals control food intake

Metadata record for: COVIDiSTRESS Global Survey dataset on psychological and behavioural consequences of the COVID-19 outbreak

This dataset contains key characteristics about the data described in the Data Descriptor COVIDiSTRESS Global Survey dataset on psychological and behavioural consequences of the COVID-19 outbreak. Contents: 1. human readable metadata summary table in CSV format 2. machine readable metadata file in JSON forma