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Resources » Paper

Lee, Kyung Suk et al. (2015) International Worm Meeting "Serotonin-dependent Pulse-Width-Modulation control of food uptake."

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  • Overview

    Status:
    Publication type:
    Meeting_abstract
    WormBase ID:
    WBPaper00047839

    Lee, Kyung Suk, Iwanir, Shachar, Kopito, Ronen, Biron, David, & Levine, Erel (2015). Serotonin-dependent Pulse-Width-Modulation control of food uptake presented in International Worm Meeting. Unpublished information; cite only with author permission.

    Animals integrate physiological and environmental signals to regulate food uptake by modulating feeding behavior. Failure to regulate feeding may have devastating results, including obesity and diabetes, underscoring the importance of understanding its underlying mechanisms. The nematode C. elegans, whose food uptake consists simply of pumping bacteria from the environment into the gut, provides excellent opportunities for discovering principles of conserved regulatory mechanisms. Here we take an approach rooted in control theory, and measure at high resolution the dynamics of feeding in response to food availability using a custom microfluidic device. We show that worms implement a graded response by balancing two discrete modes of feeding, a control mechanism known as Pulse-Width-Modulation (PWM). The bioamine serotonin, which has a conserved role in regulating feeding, is shown to be essential for the recurring transitions into the active feeding mode. Two types of serotonergic neurons are implicated in this mechanism, and two families of serotonin receptors are shown to have distinct roles in tuning its properties. We propose that PWM is a conserved mechanism of behavior and motor control.

    Affiliations:
    - Department of Physics and Center for Systems Biology, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA
    - The Institute for Biophysical Dynamics, The University of Chicago
    - Department of Physics and the James Franck Institute, The University of Chicago


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