Sexual Failure Decreases Sweet Taste Perception in Male Drosophila via Dopaminergic Signaling

• DOI: 10.7554/elife.105094.1
• Publication Date: 2025-02-18T00:25:07Z
• Authors: Gaohang Wang; Wei Qi; Rui Huang; Liming Wang

Sweet taste perception, a critical aspect of the initiation feeding behavior, is primarily regulated by an animal’s internal metabolic state. However, non-metabolic factors, such as motivational and emotional states, can also influence peripheral sensory processing hence behavior. While mating experience known to induce changes, its broader impact on other innate behaviors remains largely uncharacterized. In this study, we demonstrated that failure male fruit flies suppressed sweet perception via dopamine signaling in specific neural circuitry. Upon repetitive courtship, exhibited sustained yet reversible decline measured proboscis extension reflex (PER) towards tastants well neuronal activity sweet-sensing Gr5a + neurons proboscis. Mechanistically, identified small group dopaminergic projecting subesophageal zone (SEZ) innervating with key modulator. Repetitive sexual decreased these turn Dop1R1 Dop2R receptors. Our findings revealed role for integrating reproductive appetitive processing, providing new insights into complex interactions between different brain’s reward systems regulating states.