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Distinct memory traces for two visual features in the Drosophila brain

Nature volume 439, pages 551–556 (2006)Cite this article

Abstract

The fly Drosophila melanogaster can discriminate and remember visual landmarks. It analyses selected parts of its visual environment according to a small number of pattern parameters such as size, colour or contour orientation, and stores particular parameter values. Like humans, flies recognize patterns independently of the retinal position during acquisition of the pattern (translation invariance). Here we show that the central-most part of the fly brain, the fan-shaped body, contains parts of a network mediating visual pattern recognition. We have identified short-term memory traces of two pattern parameters—elevation in the panorama and contour orientation. These can be localized to two groups of neurons extending branches as parallel, horizontal strata in the fan-shaped body. The central location of this memory store is well suited to mediate translational invariance.

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Figure 1: Flight simulator for measuring visual pattern recognition.
Figure 2: Visual pattern memory is impaired in central complex mutants.
Figure 3: Expression patterns of three driver lines rescuing pattern memory.
Figure 4: Rescue and suppression of pattern memory occur in the adult.
Figure 5: Memory traces for pattern parameters are spatially separated.

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Acknowledgements

We thank B. Gerber and H. Tanimoto for valuable comments on the manuscript, C. Grübel, Haiyun Gong and Huoqing Jiang for excellent technical assistance, and A. Jenett for visualizing gene expression patterns. Supported by Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft, Fonds der Chemischen Industrie (M.H.), National Natural Sciences Foundation of China (L.L.), ‘973-program’ (L.L.), and by the Knowledge Innovation Project of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (L.L.).

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Author notes

  1. Gang Liu and Holger Seiler: *These authors contributed equally to this work

Authors and Affiliations

  1. State Key Laboratory of Brain and Cognitive Science, Institute of Biophysics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, 15 Datun Road, 100101, Chaoyang District, Beijing, China

    Gang Liu, Ai Wen & Li Liu

  2. Graduate School of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, 100039, Beijing, China

    Gang Liu

  3. Theodor-Boveri-Institut für Biowissenschaften, Lehrstuhl für Genetik und Neurobiologie, Am Hubland, 97074, Würzburg, Germany

    Holger Seiler, Troy Zars, Reinhard Wolf & Martin Heisenberg

  4. Division of Biological Sciences, University of Missouri, Columbia, 219 Lefevre Hall, Missouri, 65211, Columbia, USA

    Troy Zars

  5. Institute of Molecular and Cellular Biosciences, The University of Tokyo, 1-1-1 Yayoi, Bunkyo-ku, 113-0032, Tokyo, Japan

    Kei Ito

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Correspondence to Li Liu.

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Supplementary information

Supplementary Notes

This file contains Supplementary Figures 1–3, Supplementary Tables 1 and 2, Supplementary Methods and Supplementary Discussion. The Supplementary Figures show the dynamics of flight orientation behaviour of a single fly (raw data) during a learning experiment in the flight simulator (Supplementary Fig. 1), the expression patterns for all 7 driver lines which rescue the rut-dependent memory defect for pattern elevation (Supplementary Fig. 2), and a 3-D reconstruction of the tangential layer-5 Neurons (F5) in the fan-shaped body (Supplementary Fig. 3). Supplementary Table 1 addresses pattern discrimination ability of fly lines which are deficient in pattern memory and Supplementary Table 2 contains a compilation of the results of all 28 rutabaga rescue experiments accomplished in this study. (PDF 572 kb)

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Liu, G., Seiler, H., Wen, A. et al. Distinct memory traces for two visual features in the Drosophila brain. Nature 439, 551–556 (2006). https://doi.org/10.1038/nature04381

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