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Artificial Selection for Increased Maternal Defense Behavior in Mice

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Abstract

Maternal aggression is directed towards intruders by lactating females and is critical for defense of offspring. Within-family selection for increased maternal defense in outbred house mice (Mus domesticus; Hsd:ICR strain) was applied to one selected (S) line, using total duration of attacks in a 3-min test as the selection criterion. One control (C) line was maintained and both lines were propagated by 13 families in each generation. Prior to selection, heritability of maternal aggression was estimated to be 0.61 based on mother-offspring regression. Duration of attacks responded to selection with a mean realized heritability of 0.40 (corrected for within-family selection) after eight generations. At generation 5, the S and C line also differed significantly for litter size at birth and at mid-lactation (both lower in S), average individual pup mass at mid-lactation (higher in S), and pup retrieval latency (longer in S), but not for other maternal measures that we studied (e.g., dam mass). Additionally, number of entries to middle and closed plus maze compartments was significantly higher in S mice in Generation 5. This is the first study to select for high maternal defense and these mice will be made available as a tool for understanding the genetic and neural basis of maternal aggression.

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Acknowledgments

This work was supported by National Institutes of Health Grant R01 MH066086 to S.C.G and by the University of Wisconsin Graduate School and Department of Zoology. The authors wish to thank Emily Bethea, Kelly Clinkenbeard, Kimberly D’Anna, Michael Foley, Nina Hasen, Allen Irgens, Patrick Klevin, Sruthi Swaminathan, and Lindsay Theis for technical assistance and Kate Skogen and Jeff Alexander for animal care. T.G. was supported by National Science Foundation grant IBN-0212567.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Zoology, University of Wisconsin, 1117 West Johnson St., Madison, WI, 53706, USA

    Stephen C. Gammie & Sharon A. Stevenson

  2. Neuroscience Training Program, University of Wisconsin, Madison, WI, 53706, USA

    Stephen C. Gammie

  3. Department of Biology, University of California, Riverside, CA, 92521, USA

    Theodore Garland Jr.

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  1. Stephen C. Gammie
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  2. Theodore Garland Jr.
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Correspondence to Stephen C. Gammie.

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Gammie, S.C., Garland, T. & Stevenson, S.A. Artificial Selection for Increased Maternal Defense Behavior in Mice. Behav Genet 36, 713–722 (2006). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10519-006-9071-x

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10519-006-9071-x

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