PUBLICATION
High-resolution tracking of unconfined zebrafish behavior reveals stimulatory and anxiolytic effects of psilocybin
- Authors
- Braun, D., Rosenberg, A.M., Rabaniam, E., Haruvi, R., Malamud, D., Barbara, R., Aiznkot, T., Levavi-Sivan, B., Kawashima, T.
- ID
- ZDB-PUB-240118-1
- Date
- 2024
- Source
- Molecular psychiatry 29(4): 1046-1062 (Journal)
- Registered Authors
- Levavi-Sivan, Berta
- Keywords
- none
- MeSH Terms
-
- Animals
- Anti-Anxiety Agents*/pharmacology
- Anxiety/drug therapy
- Behavior, Animal*/drug effects
- Brain/drug effects
- Dorsal Raphe Nucleus/drug effects
- GABAergic Neurons/drug effects
- Hallucinogens*/pharmacology
- Ketamine/pharmacology
- Larva/drug effects
- Psilocybin*/pharmacology
- Selective Serotonin Reuptake Inhibitors/pharmacology
- Serotonergic Neurons*/drug effects
- Serotonin Receptor Agonists/pharmacology
- Swimming
- Zebrafish*
- PubMed
- 38233467 Full text @ Mol. Psychiatry
Citation
Braun, D., Rosenberg, A.M., Rabaniam, E., Haruvi, R., Malamud, D., Barbara, R., Aiznkot, T., Levavi-Sivan, B., Kawashima, T. (2024) High-resolution tracking of unconfined zebrafish behavior reveals stimulatory and anxiolytic effects of psilocybin. Molecular psychiatry. 29(4):1046-1062.
Abstract
Serotonergic psychedelics are emerging therapeutics for psychiatric disorders, yet their underlying mechanisms of action in the brain remain largely elusive. Here, we developed a wide-field behavioral tracking system for larval zebrafish and investigated the effects of psilocybin, a psychedelic serotonin receptor agonist. Machine learning analyses of precise body kinematics identified latent behavioral states reflecting spontaneous exploration, visually-driven rapid swimming, and irregular swim patterns following stress exposure. Using this method, we found that acute psilocybin treatment has two behavioral effects: [i] facilitation of spontaneous exploration ("stimulatory") and [ii] prevention of irregular swim patterns following stress exposure ("anxiolytic"). These effects differed from the effect of acute SSRI treatment and were rather similar to the effect of ketamine treatment. Neural activity imaging in the dorsal raphe nucleus suggested that psilocybin inhibits serotonergic neurons by activating local GABAergic neurons, consistent with psychedelic-induced suppression of serotonergic neurons in mammals. These findings pave the way for using larval zebrafish to elucidate neural mechanisms underlying the behavioral effects of serotonergic psychedelics.
Genes / Markers
Expression
Phenotype
Mutations / Transgenics
Human Disease / Model
Sequence Targeting Reagents
Fish
Orthology
Engineered Foreign Genes
Mapping