Physiological markers for responses to environmental stimuli in fish

The reward system in zebrafish

A thorough functional characterization of dopamine (DA) neurons to reward in fishes is still lacking. In this experiment we aim to prove that normal DA function is necessary for fish to learn about reward. Currently, we will use a DA receptor antagonist in zebrafish in order to hinder normal DA signaling and we propose that this will delay the ability for fish to learn to associate a light signal with a food reward.
We expect that fish will be under minimum distress since these experiments do not expose individuals to any negative or noxious stimuli.
Increased knowledge on reward learning provides important tools for understanding central nervous system function/dysfunction in vertebrates, which may lead to innovative biomedical breakthroughs in for example DA-related diseases such as Parkinson's.
The experiment has been designed to minimize the number of experimental animals while still providing useful scientific results. Previous experiments have helped establish the minimum amount of zebrafish to 48 individuals for this experiment.