Neural switches wake fly and make it nod off

• Autores: Alice Klein
• Localización: New scientist, ISSN 0262-4079, Nº. 3085, 2016, pág. 10
• Idioma: inglés
• Texto completo no disponible (Saber más ...)
• Resumen

  • Neuronal switches have been discovered that can suddenly rouse flies from slumber--or send them into a doze. There are several gene and brain parallels between sleep in flies and mammals. prompting researchers to turn to fruit flies to investigate how they sleep. One way to do this is to use optogenetics to activate specific neurons to see what they do. This works by using light to turn on cells that have been genetically modified to respond to certain wavelengths. Gero Miesenbock at the University of Oxford and his team have discovered how to wake flies up. They stimulated neurons that release a molecule called dopamine with light. The dopamine then switched off sleep-promoting neurons in a brain area called the dorsal fan-shaped body, waking the flies.