Zebrafish (Danio rerio) behavioral laterality predicts increased short-term avoidance memory but not stress-reactivity responses

Abstract

AbstractOnce considered a uniquely human attribute, behavioral laterality has proven to be ubiquitous among non□human animals, being frequently associated with different neurophenotypes in rodents and fish species. Zebrafish (Danio rerio) are a versatile vertebrate model system that has been widely used in translational neuropsychiatric research due their highly conserved genetic homology, well characterized physiological and extensive behavioral repertoire. Although the spontaneous left- and right-bias responses and associated behavioral domains (e.g. stress reactivity, aggression and learning) have previously been observed in other teleost species, no information regarding how spontaneous motor left-right bias responses of zebrafish predicts other behavioral domains has been described. Thus, we aimed to investigate the existence and incidence of natural left-right bias of adult zebrafish in the Y-maze test and explore any relationship of biasedness on the performance of different behavioral domains. This included learning about threat-cues in the fear conditioning test and locomotion and anxiety-related behavior in the novel tank diving test. In conclusion, we showed for the first time that zebrafish exhibit a natural manifestation of motor behavioral lateralization which can influence aversive learning responses. Although laterality did not change locomotion or anxiety-related behaviors, we found that biased animals had an altered exploration pattern in the Y-maze, making them easily discernable from their unbiased counterparts, and increased learning associated to fear cues.