a modular library of small molecule signals regulates social behaviors in caenorhabditis elegans小分子信号的模块库调节社会行为在线虫.pdfVIP

A Modular Library of Small Molecule Signals Regulates Social Behaviors in Caenorhabditis elegans 1. 2. 2 1 2 Jagan Srinivasan , Stephan H. von Reuss , Neelanjan Bose , Alon Zaslaver , Parag Mahanti , 1 2 3 1 2 Margaret C. Ho , Oran G. O’Doherty , Arthur S. Edison , Paul W. Sternberg *, Frank C. Schroeder * 1 Howard Hughes Medical Institute and Division of Biology, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, California, United States of America, 2 Boyce Thompson Institute and Department of Chemistry and Chemical Biology, Cornell University, Ithaca, New York, United States of America, 3 Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, and National High Magnetic Field Laboratory, University of Florida, Gainesville, Florida, United States of America Abstract The nematode C. elegans is an important model for the study of social behaviors. Recent investigations have shown that a family of small molecule signals, the ascarosides, controls population density sensing and mating behavior. However, despite extensive studies of C. elegans aggregation behaviors, no intraspecific signals promoting attraction or aggregation of wild-type hermaphrodites have been identified. Using comparative metabolomics, we show that the known ascarosides are accompanied by a series of derivatives featuring a tryptophan-derived indole moiety. Behavioral assays demonstrate that these indole ascarosides serve as potent intraspecific attraction and aggregation signals for hermaphrodites, in contrast to ascarosides lacking the indole group, which are repulsive. Hermaphrodite attraction to indole ascaroside