Abstract :
Emotional responses are triggered by environmental signals and involve profound changes at multiple levels, from molecular to behavior. Much has been learnt about anxiety, which is considered to be a normal reaction to a stressor. The zebrafish is a newcomer to the world of emotion research as several studies have examined behavior in larval zebrafish and their anxiety-related behavioral responses to different drugs, such as the antidepressant fluoxetine (tradename ‘Prozac’), which is typically prescribed for depression . Here we further utilize zebrafish models to explore how specific genes associated with anxiety behavior change in their expression levels with fluoxetine treatment. We treated “shy” male zebrafish (selectively bred to show high levels of motionless behavior when placed in a new environment) chronically with fluoxetine(100µg/L) or water as a control for two weeks. Using quantitative PCR, we compare whole-brain expression levels of (SLC6A11, PRL2, NPY, UCN3L, OXTL, SLC6A4a, SLC4A4b and EEF1A1A) in male zebrafish treated with fluoxetine and controls. As predicted, several specific genes’ such as SLC6A11, PRL2, NPY , UCN3L and OXTL will have significant expression changes after the use of fluoxetine. By doing all of them, we treat our shy fish to make them more bold-like in behavior and measure gene expression differences. Furthermore, we may contribute to some research related to behavioral stress responses of zebrafish, as well as drugs. Finally, our results can be related to antidepressant responses in humans.
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