Differences in Molecular Aspects of Learning and Stress Coping Styles in Zebrafish

Learning is a vital part of an organism’s survival and subsequent reproductive success. But, the molecular mechanism that leads to such learning are just beginning to be unraveled. The zebrafish is establishing a reputation as the organism to study both learning and memory at the molecular level. There is evidence that the stress coping styles known as bold and shy come with a variety of consistent characteristics that can be both reliably differentiated in the lab, and found in a variety of other species. When it comes to learning, shy zebrafish learn faster, but forget faster. Bold fish learn slower, but retain that knowledge for a longer time. The molecular explanation for this tradeoff is not known. The aim of this project is to investigate whether these stress coping styles (bold and shy) possess differences in learning, and whether those differences can be attributed to known molecular mechanisms of learning such as long-term potentiation. Using a T-maze, learning was assessed after a 5-day or 30-day training period to associate a color with a reward. Both permutations included social reward as a positive reinforcement, and the five day permutation included a negative reinforcement. We did not observe any evidence of learning with these training permutations.This could be the result of the sample size being too small, the permutation too complex, or zebrafish more difficult to train than the literature currently acknowledges. A new permutation known as condition place preference will be utilized in an attempt to solve these problems