Drosophila appetitive olfactory conditioning

Abstract

Olfactory memory paradigms have been extensively used to study memory in Drosophila since the late 1960s, and over the intervening years, investigators have made a series of worthwhile changes and "tweaks" to the procedures. This protocol provides the reader with a detailed description of the appetitive (odor-sugar) memory assay currently used in the Waddell laboratory. We also describe the essential control assays for sensory acuity and locomotor behavior. It should be emphasized that the assays we describe work adequately in our laboratory, but are also amenable to, and may be further improved by additional adjustments.