Journal
NATURE NEUROSCIENCE
Volume 9, Issue 12, Pages 1499-1505Publisher
NATURE PUBLISHING GROUP
DOI: 10.1038/nn1796
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Funding
- NIGMS NIH HHS [T32 GM007122] Funding Source: Medline
- NIMH NIH HHS [T32 MH019929] Funding Source: Medline
- NINDS NIH HHS [NS44232] Funding Source: Medline
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A memory of prior thermal experience governs Caenorhabditis elegans thermotactic behavior. On a spatial thermal gradient, C. elegans tracks isotherms near a remembered temperature we call the thermotactic set-point (T-S). The T-S corresponds to the previous cultivation temperature and can be reset by sustained exposure to a new temperature. The mechanisms underlying this behavioral plasticity are unknown, partly because sensory and experience-dependent components of thermotactic behavior have been difficult to separate. Using newly developed quantitative behavioral analyses, we demonstrate that the TS represents a weighted average of a worm's temperature history. We identify the DGK-3 diacylglycerol kinase as a thermal memory molecule that regulates the rate of TS resetting by modulating the temperature range of synaptic output, but not temperature sensitivity, of the AFD thermosensory neurons. These results provide the first mechanistic insight into the basis of experience-dependent plasticity in this complex behavior.
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