Short-term memories in Drosophila are governed by general and specific genetic systems

Abstract

In a dynamic environment, there is an adaptive value in the ability of animals to acquire and express memories. That both simple and complex animals can learn is therefore not surprising. How animals have solved this problem genetically and anatomically probably lies somewhere in a range between a single molecular/anatomical mechanism that applies to all situations and a specialized mechanism for each learning situation. With an intermediate level of nervous system complexity, the fruit fly Drosophila has both general and specific resources to support different short-term memories. Some biochemical/cellular mechanisms are common between learning situations, indicating that flies do not have a dedicated system for each learning context. The opposite possible extreme does not apply to Drosophila either. Specialization in some biochemical and anatomical terms suggests that there is not a single learning mechanism that applies to all conditions. The distributed basis of learning in Drosophila implies that these systems were independently selected. © 2010 Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Press.