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Response to change in the number of visual stimuli in zebrafish:A behavioural and molecular study

Evidence has shown that a variety of vertebrates, including fish, can discriminate collections of visual items on the basis of their numerousness using an evolutionarily conserved system for approximating numerical magnitude (the so-called Approximate Number System, ANS). Here we combine a habituati...

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Autores principales: Messina, Andrea, Potrich, Davide, Schiona, Ilaria, Sovrano, Valeria Anna, Fraser, Scott E., Brennan, Caroline H., Vallortigara, Giorgio
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Nature Publishing Group UK 2020
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7113307/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/32238844
http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41598-020-62608-5
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author Messina, Andrea
Potrich, Davide
Schiona, Ilaria
Sovrano, Valeria Anna
Fraser, Scott E.
Brennan, Caroline H.
Vallortigara, Giorgio
author_facet Messina, Andrea
Potrich, Davide
Schiona, Ilaria
Sovrano, Valeria Anna
Fraser, Scott E.
Brennan, Caroline H.
Vallortigara, Giorgio
author_sort Messina, Andrea
collection PubMed
description Evidence has shown that a variety of vertebrates, including fish, can discriminate collections of visual items on the basis of their numerousness using an evolutionarily conserved system for approximating numerical magnitude (the so-called Approximate Number System, ANS). Here we combine a habituation/dishabituation behavioural task with molecular biology assays to start investigating the neural bases of the ANS in zebrafish. Separate groups of zebrafish underwent a habituation phase with a set of 3 or 9 small red dots, associated with a food reward. The dots changed in size, position and density from trial to trial but maintained their numerousness, and the overall areas of the stimuli was kept constant. During the subsequent dishabituation test, zebrafish faced a change (i) in number (from 3 to 9 or vice versa with the same overall surface), or (ii) in shape (with the same overall surface and number), or (iii) in size (with the same shape and number). A control group of zebrafish was shown the same stimuli as during the habituation. RT-qPCR revealed that the telencephalon and thalamus were characterized by the most consistent modulation of the expression of the immediate early genes c-fos and egr-1 upon change in numerousness; in contrast, the retina and optic tectum responded mainly to changes in stimulus size.
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spelling pubmed-71133072020-04-06 Response to change in the number of visual stimuli in zebrafish:A behavioural and molecular study Messina, Andrea Potrich, Davide Schiona, Ilaria Sovrano, Valeria Anna Fraser, Scott E. Brennan, Caroline H. Vallortigara, Giorgio Sci Rep Article Evidence has shown that a variety of vertebrates, including fish, can discriminate collections of visual items on the basis of their numerousness using an evolutionarily conserved system for approximating numerical magnitude (the so-called Approximate Number System, ANS). Here we combine a habituation/dishabituation behavioural task with molecular biology assays to start investigating the neural bases of the ANS in zebrafish. Separate groups of zebrafish underwent a habituation phase with a set of 3 or 9 small red dots, associated with a food reward. The dots changed in size, position and density from trial to trial but maintained their numerousness, and the overall areas of the stimuli was kept constant. During the subsequent dishabituation test, zebrafish faced a change (i) in number (from 3 to 9 or vice versa with the same overall surface), or (ii) in shape (with the same overall surface and number), or (iii) in size (with the same shape and number). A control group of zebrafish was shown the same stimuli as during the habituation. RT-qPCR revealed that the telencephalon and thalamus were characterized by the most consistent modulation of the expression of the immediate early genes c-fos and egr-1 upon change in numerousness; in contrast, the retina and optic tectum responded mainly to changes in stimulus size. Nature Publishing Group UK 2020-04-01 /pmc/articles/PMC7113307/ /pubmed/32238844 http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41598-020-62608-5 Text en © The Author(s) 2020 Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons license, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons license and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.
spellingShingle Article
Messina, Andrea
Potrich, Davide
Schiona, Ilaria
Sovrano, Valeria Anna
Fraser, Scott E.
Brennan, Caroline H.
Vallortigara, Giorgio
Response to change in the number of visual stimuli in zebrafish:A behavioural and molecular study
title Response to change in the number of visual stimuli in zebrafish:A behavioural and molecular study
title_full Response to change in the number of visual stimuli in zebrafish:A behavioural and molecular study
title_fullStr Response to change in the number of visual stimuli in zebrafish:A behavioural and molecular study
title_full_unstemmed Response to change in the number of visual stimuli in zebrafish:A behavioural and molecular study
title_short Response to change in the number of visual stimuli in zebrafish:A behavioural and molecular study
title_sort response to change in the number of visual stimuli in zebrafish:a behavioural and molecular study
topic Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7113307/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/32238844
http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41598-020-62608-5
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