Abstract
Drosophila melanogaster (common fruit flies) survives a wide range of natural environments and can grow adaptation to seasonal temperature drop (seasonal cold-hardening, SCH) and to imminent cold weather (rapid cold-hardening, RCH). While SCH is mediated mainly by transcriptional and physiological changes, the mechanisms behind RCH are unknown. During this short-term adaptation, neuronal signaling and neuromodulation is likely involved. In this project, we screened through 129 neuropeptides and GPCR genes mutant strains (chemoconnectome-attP) and found a few candidates, including 5-HT2A, Capa, Dop1R2, moody, CG4313 and other genes, that are potentially involved in RCH. Confirmation of the result were done using neuronal knock-out of these genes with CRISPR/Cas9 and the UAS/Gal4 system. An attempt to achieve RCH by thermogenetically activating Dop1R2- and 5-HT2A-positive neurons using dTrpA1 was also performed but no significant level of RCH was observed.