Work

Tyramine action on motoneuron excitability and adaptable tyramine/octopamine ratios adjust Drosophila locomotion to nutritional state

Year: 2019

Type: article

Abstract: receptor activation and by downstream decrease of L-type calcium current. This central effect of tyramine on motoneurons is required for the adaptive reduction of locomotor activity after feeding. Similarly, peripheral octopamine action on motoneurons has been reported to be required for increasing locomotion upon starvation. We further show that the level of tyramine-β-hydroxylase (TBH), the enzyme that converts tyramine into octopamine in aminergic neurons, is increased by food deprivation, thus selecting between antagonistic amine actions on motoneurons. Therefore, octopamine and tyramine provide global but distinctly different mechanisms to regulate motoneuron excitability and behavioral plasticity, and their antagonistic actions are balanced within a dynamic range by nutritional effects on TBH.

Source: Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences

DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1813554116