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fruitless regulates aggression and dominance in Drosophila

Abstract

When competing for resources, two Drosophila melanogaster flies of the same sex fight each other. Males and females fight with distinctly different styles, and males but not females establish dominance relationships. Here we show that sex-specific splicing of the fruitless gene plays a critical role in determining who and how a fly fights, and whether a dominance relationship forms.

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Figure 1: Patterns of aggression in fru splicing mutants.
Figure 2: Selected aggression scenes.
Figure 3: Dominance.

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Acknowledgements

We thank members of the Kravitz and Dickson laboratories for their support and comments on the manuscript. Work by E.V., E.D., and B.J.D. is supported by Boehringer Ingelheim GmbH. Work by E.A.K. and S.P.N. is supported in part by US National Institutes of Health grants GM067645 and GM072411, respectively.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Contributions

E.V. conducted the experiments together with S.P.N. in the laboratory of E.A.K.; E.D. generated various fly stocks; E.V. and B.J.D. analyzed the data; and B.J.D. wrote the manuscript with contributions from all other authors.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Barry J Dickson.

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Competing interests

The authors declare no competing financial interests.

Supplementary information

Supplementary Video 1

A fight between two fruC males. The fight begins with low-intensity aggression (fencing), and rapidly escalates to mid- and high-intensity components (lunging and boxing, respectively). (MOV 184 kb)

Supplementary Video 2

A fight between two fruC females. One female drives the other off the food source, using low-intensity aggression (fencing) and mid-intensity components (head-butts and shoving). (MOV 266 kb)

Supplementary Video 3

A fight between two fruF males. The two males jostle over the resource using female-style aggression involving head-butting and shoving. Fencing is also observed. (MOV 268 kb)

Supplementary Video 4

A fight between a fruF male and a fruC female. Both flies fight using female-style aggression, as exemplified by the shoves and head-butts that accompany fencing. The fruF male does not court the fruC female. (MOV 750 kb)

Supplementary Video 5

Fights between a fruF male and a fruM female. The fruM female chases the male away, mostly using lunges in (a), as well as fencing in both videos. Towards the end of the scene shown in (b), the female rises to box—an aggressive gesture to which a male fly would normally respond but the fruF male does not. In both videos, the male mostly fences and retreats. Neither fly courts. (MOV 658 kb)

Supplementary Video 6

Fights between a fruF male and a fruM female. The fruM female chases the male away, and both flies engage in fencing. Neither fly courts. Towards the end of the scene, the female rises to box—an aggressive gesture to which a male fly would normally respond but the fruF male does not. (MOV 132 kb)

Supplementary Methods (PDF 73 kb)

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Vrontou, E., Nilsen, S., Demir, E. et al. fruitless regulates aggression and dominance in Drosophila. Nat Neurosci 9, 1469–1471 (2006). https://doi.org/10.1038/nn1809

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