Abstracts - Association for Chemoreception Sciences

is predominant in Asians. The G180R SNP is rare in Africans
and Caucasians who typically exhibit wet, yellow earwax. For
the first time, analytical analysis of earwax odorants has been
performed and the principle odorants in both earwax phenotypes
will be discussed. The odor of each ear wax type was informally
accessed and the principal odorants were found to be volatile
organic C 2
-to-C 8
acids. A comparison between volatile earwax
and axillary odors will also be presented. Acknowledgements:
NIH postdoctoral training grant (2T32DC000014-32A1) ARO
(W911NF-11-1-0087)
#P190 POSTER SESSION IV:
CHEMICAL SIGNALING AND BEHAVIOR;
ANIMAL BEHAVIOR/PSYCHOPHYSICS;
CHEMOSENSATION AND METABOLISM;
VOMERONSASAL AND CHEMICAL
COMMUNICATION
Loss and Recovery of Odorant-Mediated Behavior Correlates
with Plasticity of Axonal Projections in the Zebrafish
Olfactory Bulb in a Reversible Deafferentation Model
Evan J White, Taylor R Paskin, Christine A Byrd-Jacobs
Western Michigan University/Biological Sciences Kalamazoo, MI, USA
We have found that the repeated exposure of adult zebrafish
olfactory epithelium to the detergent Triton X-100 results in fish
losing the ability to respond to odorants associated with social
behavior but retaining the ability to respond to odorants linked
to feeding behavior. Using a reversible deafferentation technique,
we find that fish recover the ability to detect social cues. The
aim of the present study was to determine a biological basis
for this phenomenon by examining axonal projections after a
single treatment with TX-100. Axons of three olfactory sensory
neuron subtypes (ciliated, microvillar, and crypt) were identified
using immunocytochemistry on paraffin sections. In control
bulbs, anti-KLH labeled all glomeruli, while anti-calretinin
labeled fewer axons throughout the bulb. Anti-Gas/olf labeling
was concentrated in the medial and dorsal bulb, and anti-S-100
labeling was more obvious in the lateral bulb. Within the first
4 days after TX-100 treatment, anti-KLH and anti-calretinin
labeling in the deafferented bulb showed an overall reduction,
with prominent loss in the medial bulb and preservation of some
axons in the lateral bulb. By 7 days, innervation returned to near
control levels. Staining in the deafferented bulb with anti-Gas/olf
and anti-S-100 was absent 1 day following treatment but returned
within 7 days. Examination of the axon patterns showed a
selective preservation of certain olfactory sensory axons, while
others are temporarily destroyed. The presumptive microvillar
axons that survive treatment in the lateral bulb may account for
the persistent ability of zebrafish to detect food odorants while
the temporary destruction of ciliated axons in the medial bulb
is consistent with the loss and recovery of the ability to detect
social cues. Acknowledgements: Supported by NIH-NIDCD
#011137 (CBJ)
#P191 POSTER SESSION IV:
CHEMICAL SIGNALING AND BEHAVIOR;
ANIMAL BEHAVIOR/PSYCHOPHYSICS;
CHEMOSENSATION AND METABOLISM;
VOMERONSASAL AND CHEMICAL
COMMUNICATION
Coexistence of determined and variable sensory coding
strategies in the mouse vomeronasal system
Tobias Ackels 1 , Annika Cichy 1 , Angeldeep Kaur 2 , Maria Kateri 3 ,
Tobias Marton 2 , Darren Logan 2,4 , Lisa Stowers 2 , Marc Spehr 1
1
Department of Chemosensation, RWTH Aachen University Aachen,
Germany, 2 Department of Cell Biology, The Scripps Research Institute
La Jolla, CA, USA, 3 Institute of Statistics, RWTH Aachen University
Aachen, Germany, 4 Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute, Hinxton
Cambridge, United Kingdom
The mouse vomeronasal organ (VNO) is an important
chemosensory subsystem that has been implicated in a variety
of social and sexual behaviors. In contrast to combinatorial
odor coding by neurons in the main olfactory epithelium,
vomeronasal sensory neurons (VSNs) are thought to function
as narrowly tuned, dedicated sensors of intrinsically instructive
semiochemicals. Here, we investigate the tuning profile(s)
of a group of VSNs that are collectively characterized by
their sensitivity to a specific class of behaviorally relevant
chemosignals: major urinary proteins (MUPs). Using
extracellular ‘loose-seal’ patch-clamp recordings from optically
identified basal VSNs in acute coronal VNO slices, we record
stimulus-dependent action potential discharge in response to
recombinant MUPs, specific for either the C57BL/6J or the
BALB/cByJ inbred strain of laboratory mice. Furthermore,
we comparatively analyzed the role(s) of these stimuli in two
different male-specific behaviors: male-male aggression and
territorial countermarking. Surprisingly, electrophysiological
activity profiling revealed parallel detection of MUPs by both
‘specialist’ neurons selectively tuned to a particular stimulus
and broad range responders (‘generalists’) sensitive to all or
subset combinations of the MUPs tested. These data suggest the
coexistence of determined and variable sensory coding strategies
in the mouse vomeronasal system. In addition, behavioral assays
indicate that MUPs regulate at least two different male behaviors.
While dedicated ligands promote aggression, a combinatorial
MUP code controls countermarking. Together, our results show
that a vomeronasal stimulus can encode divergent information
through both dedicated and combinatorial neural mechanisms.
POSTER PRESENTATIONS
Abstracts are printed as submitted by the author(s).
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