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Influence of the quick-to-court gene deletion on courtship behaviour of Drosophila melanogaster

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Abstract

Using an original method, we have received Drosophila melanogaster with a deficiency including a complete sequence of quick-to-court gene. In this report, we describe the behavioural features of this new deletion mutant. There were no serious deviations from the normal mating behaviour in flies with the deletion, but the behaviour of deletion mutants still had some features. Of all the elements, only the frequency of licking significantly increased in mutants. The duration of mating elements did not change in flies with deletion, and the latent period decreased only for following the female and licking. We have found that mutant males produce more courtship song than control males when courting Oregon R females as estimated by the pulse song index. In our experiment, mutant females provoked much less pulse song production by Oregon R males than control females do. Moreover, Oregon R males initiate courtship song towards mutant females later than towards control females. In other words, the study of pulse song production showed that the deficiency in females leads to a decrease in the intensity of courtship of wild-type males, whereas the deficiency in males leads to more intensive care for wild-type females.

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Acknowledgements

We thank Prof. George Rohrmann (Oregon State University, USA) for critical reading and comments on the manuscript. This work was conducted under the Institute of Developmental Biology Russian Academy of Sciences Government basic research program, no. 0088-2021-0019 and Government program 47 ‘Scientific and technological development of Russian Federation’ (2019-2030), part 0134-2019-0004. The research was done using equipment of the Core Centrum of Institute of Developmental Biology RAS. This study was funded by grant from the Russian Foundation for Fundamental Investigations (grant number 18-04-00177).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Koltzov Institute of Developmental Biology, Russian Academy of Sciences, Moscow, 119334, Russia

    Elena G. Belkina, Oleg E. Lazebny, Nikolay G. Gornostaev, Victor S. Mikhailov & Oksana I. Kravchuk

  2. Pavlov Institute of Physiology, Russian Academy of Sciences, St. Petersburg, 199034, Russia

    Larisa V. Danilenkova, Natalia G. Besedina, Julia V. Bragina & Nikolai G. Kamyshev

  3. Institute of Gene Biology, Russian Academy of Sciences, Moscow, 119334, Russia

    Vladimir V. Sokolov

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  1. Elena G. Belkina
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  2. Oleg E. Lazebny
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Correspondence to Oksana I. Kravchuk.

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Belkina, E.G., Lazebny, O.E., Gornostaev, N.G. et al. Influence of the quick-to-court gene deletion on courtship behaviour of Drosophila melanogaster. J Genet 100, 37 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12041-021-01284-4

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12041-021-01284-4

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