This project proposes to develop a new class of automated instruments for quantifying complex animal behavior quickly and efficiently, an effort that will be used for many health issues related to human behavior. The effort will focus on the fruit fly, Drosophila melanogaster, because it currently represents the best opportunity for integrating state-of-the-art genetic techniques with a new generation of behavioral assays. Recent research has proven the fruit fly to be a powerful model system for studying many clinically-relevant features of human behavior. This strategy makes use of the fact that the nerve cells of flies and human share many common genetic features, which may be identified quite readily using tools available in fruit flies. For example, investigations that exploit the powerful genetic tools available in this organism have identified a series of candidate genes involved in alcohol and drug tolerance. Recent studies of human populations indicate similar genes may be involved in alcohol addiction. This strategy is not restricted to studies of drug and alcohol addiction, but has also been successfully exploited to study other features of human biology including aging, obesity, fear, aggression and sleep disorders. The potential and impact of these approaches is based on the ease of genetic analyses in flies and also on the ability to accurately identify behavioral defects in large numbers of animals. The goal of this grant will be to thoroughly modernize the quantification of fly behavior so that this genetic model organism can be used more efficiently in the study of a variety of behaviors related to human health. The project team will design, test, and make available three distinct systems that collectively will permit high-throughput quantitative analysis of the individual and social behaviors of adult Drosophila. In designing these instruments, the project team will make use of their collective expertise in machine vision as well as years of practical experience building specialized instruments for quantifying fly behavior. The devices will be intelligent, in that they will be able to automatically identify the most useful measurements to be carried out for a given task, as well as suggest possibly novel models of behavior. They will be based on off-the-shelf video and computer technology to be inexpensive and thus easy to use for the average molecular biologist. Much effort will be made to ensure that the resulting technology will be of use to a broad international community of researchers. Like the robotic sequencers that revolutionized the study of genomics, these devices will help transform behavioral science into a modern discipline of Ethometrics.
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