Aversive pheromone:Pheromone Resources

Aversive pheromone:

In mice an androgen-dependent aversive pheromone found in male urine discourages prolonged investigation of a treated area by other male mice. Castration of the urine donor eliminated the aversive effect of urine, testosterone therapy reestablished it (Jones and Nowell, 1973a). Dominant male urine is far more effective in producing this effect than subordinate male urine, which is no more effective than water (Jones and Nowell, 1973b). Aversive pheromone of dominant males induces greater emotionality and lower activity in subordinates, and that the lower levels of androgen dependent. A comparison of the aversive and female attractant properties of urine from dominant and subordinate male mice  (Jones and Nowell, 1974a) and  reported the the urinary aversive pheromone in mice: Species, strain and grouping effect (Jones and Nowell, 1974a,b).

Queen mandibular pheromone (QMP) has profound effects on dopamine signaling in the brain of young worker honey bees. As dopamine in insects has been strongly implicated in aversive learning, we examined QMP's impact on associative olfactory learning in bees. We found that QMP blocks aversive learning in young workers, but leaves appetitive learning intact (Vergoz et al.2007).

Studies have shown that exposing young worker bees (Apis mellifera) to queen mandibular pheromone (QMP) reduces their aversive learning performance, while enhancing their attraction to QMP. As QMP has been found to reduce the rate of juvenile hormone (JH) synthesis in worker bees, we examined whether aversive learning in 2-day old workers exposed to QMP from the time of adult emergence could be improved by injecting JH (10 µg in a 2 µl volume) into the haemolymph. We examined in addition, the effects of JH treatment on worker attraction to QMP, and on the levels of expression of amine receptor genes in the antennae, as well as in the mushroom bodies of the brain. We found that memory acquisition and 1-hour memory recall were enhanced by JH. In contrast, JH treatment reduced the bees' attraction towards a synthetic strip impregnated with QMP (Bee Boost) (McQuillan et al.,2014).

de Bono et al.(2002) reported that natural Caenorhabditis elegans isolates exhibit either social or solitary feeding on bacteria. Feeding is induced by nociceptive neurons that detect adverse or stressful conditions. Ablation of the nociceptive neurons ASH and ADL transforms social animals into solitary feeders. Social feeding is probably due to the sensation of noxious chemicals by ASH and ADL neurons; it requires the genes ocr-2 and osm-9, which encode TRP-related transduction channels, and odr-4 and odr-8, which are required to localize sensory chemoreceptors to cilia. Other sensory neurons may suppress social feeding, as social feeding in ocr-2 and odr-4 mutants is restored by mutations in osm-3, a gene required for the development of 26 ciliated sensory neurons.

Novotny (2003) implicating structurally both male and female mouse signals responsible for aversive responses of male rats to androgen-dependent chemosignals (W. Ma, M.V. Novotny and J.R. Alberts, unpublished work).

Reproductive behavior in Drosophila has both stereotyped and plastic components that are driven by age and sex-specific chemical cues. Males who unsuccessfully court virgin females subsequently avoid females that are of the same age as the trainer. In contrast, males trained with mature mated females associate volatile appetitive and aversive pheromonal cues and learn to suppress courtship of all females. (Ejima et al.,2007).

Moon et al.(2009) reported that GR33a does not function in receptor trafficking, as is the case for OR83b in olfactory receptor neurons. These results raise the possibility that GR33a serves as an obligatory receptor subunit for the detection rather than the trafficking of all repellent compounds that are sensed through contact chemosensation, including aversive tastants and pheromones.

Roussel et al.(2009) questioned do bees that exhibit high responsiveness to sucrose also display high responsiveness to an aversive stimulus?. The scientist used a new protocol  for olfactory aversive conditioning of SER (Vergoz et al.,2007). The findings says bees significantly  increased their aversive response (SER) to electric shocks of increasing voltage (F5,1980= 487.23, p,0.0001; not shown). Bees with low responsiveness scores (scores 1 to 3; n= 67) responded only to higher voltages (2 to 8 V) while bees with high responsiveness scores (scores 4 to 6; n =80) responded to a broader range of voltages starting with lower ones (0.25, 0.5 or 1 V).

In Drosophila melanogaster the treatment of virgin females with the aversive male pheromone cis-vaccenyl acetate (cVA) significantly delayed mating of oe^- females compared to wild-type females. This difference was eliminated when oe^- females were treated with a blend of cVA and the female aphrodisiac (7Z,11Z)-heptacosadiene (7,11-HD), showing that female aphrodisiac compounds can attenuate the effects of male aversive pheromones  (Billeter et al.,2009).

QMP was also recently shown to suppress the capacity of young bees to learn aversive  experiences leaving appetitive ones intact (Vergoz et al., 2007 in Sandoz et al.,2007). Ejima et al.(2005)

The US is believed to be an aversive understood. substance that females produce after mating, whereas the CS is a courtship-stimulating chemical cue, or pheromones (Tompkins et al.,1983 in Ejima et al.,2005). The behavioral responses to attractive and aversive odors were examined in blinded adult male cockroaches under tethered-walking conditions. A sex pheromone-like stimulant derived from adult virgin females and artificially synthesized limonene were used as attractive and aversive odor sources, respectively. When a searching animal was stimulated with the attractive female-derived odor, the horizontal deflections of both the antennae were increased, and in most cases the vertical antennal positions were shifted downward. The stimulation also significantly decreased the walking speed of the animal. These behavioral changes imply a careful search in the immediate surroundings. The aftereffect of the sex pheromone was more pronounced on locomotion than on antennal movement. On the other hand, stimulation with the aversive odor (limonene) tended to suppress active antennal movement, and also increased the walking speed. Immediately after the withdrawal of the aversive odor, the active movement of the antennae was resumed, and the walking speed rapidly decreased to a level approximately the same as that of the control period (Nishiyama et al.,2007) .

In human, neuroimaging studies of conditioning  have essentially focused on aversive paradigms (Buchel et al., 1998; LaBar et al., 1998; Morris et al., 2001 in Gottfried et al., 2002),

References:

Billeter, J. C., Atallah, J., Krupp, J. J., Millar, J. G. and  Levine, J. D. 2009. Specialized cells tag sexual and species identity in Drosophila melanogaster. Nature, 461(7266):987-991.

Buchel C, Morris J, Dolan RJ, Friston KJ (1998) Brain systems mediating aversive conditioning: an event-related fMRI study. Neuron 20:947–957.

Christiansen, E.1976.Pheromones in small rodents and their potential use in pest control. In Proceedings of the 7th Vertebrate Pest Conference,11.

de Bono, M., Tobin, D. M., Davis, M. W., Avery, L. and  Bargmann, C. I. 2002. Social feeding in Caenorhabditis elegans is induced by neurons that detect aversive stimuli. Nature, 419(6910): 899-903.

Ejima, A., Smith, B. P., Lucas, C., Levine, J. D. and  Griffith, L. C. 2005. Sequential learning of pheromonal cues modulates memory consolidation in trainer-specific associative courtship conditioning. Current biology, 15(3):194-206.

Ejima, A., Smith, B. P., Lucas, C., van Naters, W. V. D. G., Miller, C. J., Carlson, J. R. Joel D. Levine and  Griffith, L. C. 2007. Generalization of courtship learning in Drosophila is mediated by cis-vaccenyl acetate. Current biology, 17(7):599-605.

Gottfried, J. A., O'Doherty, J. and Dolan, R. J. 2002. Appetitive and aversive olfactory learning in humans studied using event-related functional magnetic resonance imaging. The Journal of Neuroscience, 22(24):10829-10837.

Jones, R.B.  and N.W. Nowell. 1973.The coagulating glands as a source of aversive and aggression-inhibiting pheromone(s) in the male albino mouse. Physiology and Behavior.,11(4):455-462.

Jones, R.B. and Nowell, N.W. 1973a. The effect of urine on the investigatory behavior of male albino mice. Physiol. Behav. 11:33-38.

Jones, R.B. and Nowell, N.W.. 1973b. Aversive and aggression-promoting properties of urine from dominant and subordinate male mice. Anim. Learn. Behav. 1:207-210.

Jones, R.B. and Nowell, N.W.. 1974a. A comparison of the aversive and female attractant properties of urine from dominant and subordinate male mice. Anim. Learn. Behav.2:141-144.

Jones, R.B. and Nowell, N.W.. 1974b. The urinary aversive pheromone in mice: Species, strain and grouping effect. Anim. Behav. 22:187-191.

LaBar KS, Gatenby JC, Gore JC, LeDoux JE, Phelps EA (1998) Human amygdala activation during conditioned fear acquisition and extinction: a mixed-trial fMRI study. Neuron 20:937–945.

McQuillan, H.J., Nakagawa, S., Mercer, A.R.2014. Juvenile hormone enhances aversive learning performance in 2-day old worker honey bees while reducing their attraction to queen mandibular pheromone. PLoS One. 2014 Nov 12;9(11):e112740.

Moon, S. J., Lee, Y., Jiao, Y. and  Montell, C. 2009. A Drosophila gustatory receptor essential for aversive taste and inhibiting male-to-male courtship. Current Biology, 19(19):1623-1627.

Morris JS, Buchel C, Dolan RJ (2001) Parallel neural responses in amygdala subregions and sensory cortex during implicit fear conditioning. NeuroImage 13:1044–1052.

Nishiyama, K., Okada, J. and  Toh, Y. 2007. Antennal and locomotor responses to attractive and aversive odors in the searching cockroach. Journal of Comparative Physiology A, 193(9):963-971.

Novotny, M. V. 2003. Pheromones, binding proteins and receptor responses in rodents. Biochemical Society Transactions, 31(1):117-122.

Roussel, E., Carcaud, J., Sandoz, J. C. and  Giurfa, M. 2009. Reappraising social insect behavior through aversive responsiveness and learning. PLoS One, 4(1):e4197.

Sandoz, J. C., Deisig, N., de Brito Sanchez, M. G. and   Giurfa, M. 2007. Understanding the logics of pheromone processing in the honeybee brain: from labeled-lines to across-fiber patterns. Frontiers in behavioral neuroscience, 1.

Tompkins, L., Siegel, R.W., Gailey, D.A., and Hall, J.C. 1983. Conditioned courtship in Drosophila and its mediation by association of chemical cues. Behav. Genet. 13: 565–578.

Vergoz, V., Roussel, E., Sandoz, J.C., Giurfa, M. 2007. Aversive learning in honeybees revealed by the conditioning of the sting extension reflex. PloS one issue3. e288.

Vergoz, V., Schreurs,H.A. and  Mercer, A.R.2007. Queen pheromone blocks aversive learning in young worker bees. Science. ,317(5836):384-386.