10.6084/m9.figshare.12148719.v1
jodie schiffer
jodie
schiffer
Francesco Servello
Francesco
Servello
william heath
william
heath
Francis Raj Gandhi Amrit
Francis
Raj Gandhi Amrit
stephanie stumbur
stephanie
stumbur
sean johnsen
sean
johnsen
Julian Stanley
Julian
Stanley
hannah tam
hannah
tam
sarah brennan
sarah
brennan
natalie mcgowan
natalie
mcgowan
abigail vogelaar
abigail
vogelaar
yuan xu
yuan
xu
william serkin
william
serkin
Arjumand Ghazi
Arjumand
Ghazi
Javier Apfeld
Javier
Apfeld
Caenorhabditis elegans processes sensory information to choose between freeloading and self-defense strategies
TAGC 2020
2020
daf-7
oxidative stress
ASI
daf-16
skn-1
environmental perception
TGF β receptor
IGF 1
Genetics
Neurogenetics
2020-04-20 22:59:23
Poster
https://tagc2020.figshare.com/articles/poster/Caenorhabditis_elegans_processes_sensory_information_to_choose_between_freeloading_and_self-defense_strategies/12148719
Hydrogen peroxide is the preeminent chemical weapon that organisms use for combat. Individual cells rely on conserved defenses to prevent and repair peroxide-induced damage, but whether similar defenses might be coordinated across cells in animals remains poorly understood. Here, we identify a neuronal circuit in the nematode <i>Caenorhabditis elegans </i>that processes information perceived by two sensory neurons to control the induction of hydrogen peroxide defenses in the organism. We found that catalases produced by <i>Escherichia coli</i>, the nematode’s food source, can deplete hydrogen peroxide from the local environment and thereby protect the nematodes. <i></i>In the presence of <i>E.coli</i>, the nematode’s neurons signal via TGFβ-insulin/IGF1 relay to target tissues to repress expression of catalases and other hydrogen peroxide defenses. This adaptive strategy is the first example of a multicellular organism modulating its defenses when it expects to freeload from the protection provided by molecularly orthologous defenses from another species.