Caloric State Modulates Locomotion, Heart Rate and Motor Neuron Responses to Acute Administration of D-amphetamine in Zebrafish Larvae

Psychostimulant drugs increase behavioral, cardiac and brain responses in humans and other animals. Acute food deprivation or chronic food restriction potentiates the stimulatory effects of abused drugs and increases the propensity for relapse to drug seeking in drug-experienced animals. The mechanisms by which hunger affects cardiac and behavioral activities are only beginning to be elucidated. Moreover, changes in motor neuron activities at the single neuron level induced by psychostimulants, and their modulation by food restriction, remain unknown. Here we investigated how food deprivation affects responses to d-amphetamine by measuring locomotor activity, cardiac output, and individual motor neuron activity in zebrafish larvae. We used wild-type larval zebrafish to record behavioral and cardiac responses and the larvae of Tg(mnx1:GCaMP5) transgenic zebrafish to record motor neuron responses. Physiological state gated responses to d-amphetamine. That is, d-amphetamine evoked significant increases in motor behavior (swimming distances), heart rate and motor neuron firing frequency in food-deprived but not fed zebrafish larvae. The results extend the finding that signals arising from food deprivation are a key potentiator of the drug responses induced by d-amphetamine to the zebrafish model. The larval zebrafish is an ideal model to further elucidate this interaction and identify key neuronal substrates that may increase vulnerability to drug reinforcement, drug-seeking and relapse.