Synaptic Plasticity following sleep deprivation in the fruit fly Drosophila melanogaster

FLORENCIA FERNÁNDEZ; NARA I. MURARO

Ciudad Autónoma de Buenos Aires

Congreso; 2nd FALAN (Federation of Latin-American and Caribbean Societies for Neuroscience) Congress; 2016

Federation of Latin American and Caribbean Neuroscience Societies (FALAN)

The study of fly sleep behavior is relatively novel and is therefore a fertile field for new research lines. Sleep deprivation, caused either by environmental or physiological factors, is likely to interfere with the synaptic homeostasis processes associated to sleep. The aim of this project is to describe sleep deprivation-associated changes of synaptic plasticity in the large lateral ventral neurons (lLNvs). These neurons intersect the sleep and circadian circuits of Drosophila and, interestingly, have been described to undergo synaptic changes under different environmental conditions, including situations where sleep pressure is imposed to the organism. We are studying the levels and distribution of different synaptic markers after sleep deprivation, in particular we are assessing peptidergic and classical neurotransmission. Moreover, via RNAi-mediated downregulation of the GABA receptor on lLNvs, we are analyzing the role of predicted GABAergic inputs that mediate homeostatic sleep regulation into the phenomenon of synaptic plasticity studied. Information obtained from this research project will help to produce a model of synaptic plasticity in the context of sleep deprivation. Moreover, it will contribute to the understanding of how arousal neurons process information and translate it into its neuronal outputs.