How do make a fish swim faster? Researchers say getting it DRUNK can double its speed - but only if it can show off to other fish
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It is a bizarre experiment that could help explain human behavior when drunk.
Researchers in New York gave ethanol to a zebrafish - and found that, when surrounded by other fish, its swimming speed doubled.
However, the stunned team found no difference if the fish was alone - raising new questions about the effects of alcohol in social settings.
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The NY researchers devised an original method that would allow for detailed tracking of a single, alcohol-exposed zebrafish amid a school of 'sober' peers.
HOW THEY DID IT
Porfiri and his colleagues designed an experimental procedure in which a single zebrafish was exposed to four concentrations of ethanol in water, ranging from zero to high.
They said the test poses no harm to the fish.
Following exposure, the fish was released into a group of untreated zebrafish.
To the researchers' knowledge, this is the first experiment to allow ethanol-exposed and untreated zebrafish to swim freely together.
A custom tracking algorithm developed by the team allowed the researchers to follow for the first time individual fish throughout the experiment as well as analyze group behavior.
The findings published by researchers at the New York University Polytechnic School of Engineering are helping to unravel the complex interplay between alcohol and social behavior and may lead to new therapies for mitigating the negative impacts of alcohol use and abuse, the researchers say.
Their experiments, published in the current issue of Alcohol: Clinical and Experimental Research, were led by Maurizio Porfiri.
Traditional experiments for alcohol-related studies see subjects are exposed and their behavior and movements analyzed.
The NY researchers devised an original method that would allow for detailed tracking of a single, alcohol-exposed zebrafish amid a school of 'sober' peers.
Porfiri and his colleagues developed an experimental procedure in which a single zebrafish was exposed to four concentrations of ethanol in water, ranging from zero to high.
This is called acute exposure and poses no harm to the fish, the researchers say.
Following exposure, the fish was released into a group of untreated zebrafish.
To the researchers' knowledge, this is the first experiment to allow ethanol-exposed and untreated zebrafish to swim freely together.
The speed of the drunk fish stunned researchers
A custom tracking algorithm developed by the team allowed the researchers to follow for the first time individual fish throughout the experiment as well as analyze group behavior.
Previous studies show alcohol exposure affects zebrafish locomotion—at low concentrations, fish tend to swim faster, and as the dose increases, swimming typically slows.
Alcohol can also negatively impact the school's cohesion.
In Porfiri's trials, the single exposed zebrafish showed changes in locomotion when observed alone consistent to those predicted by past studies.
In a group setting, however, the zebrafish behavior was remarkably different: Fish exposed to intermediate or high alcohol concentrations nearly doubled their swimming speeds, the team found, suggesting that the presence of peers had a substantial impact on social behavior under the influence of alcohol.
Most remarkably, the unexposed fish also modulated their behavior and swimming speeds differentially in the presence of a shoalmate exposed to different levels of alcohol.
'These results were very surprising,' explained Porfiri.
'It is clear that the untreated fish were matching the swimming speed of the alcohol-exposed fish, and this correlation was especially strong at an intermediate level of alcohol exposure.
'At very high or low levels, the influence decreases.'
Porfiri believes that one explanation for the high-speed swimming of the exposed individual may be hyper-reactivity to an enriched environment—the tank containing shoalmates.
Maurizio Porfiri, who devised an original method that would allow for detailed tracking of a single, alcohol-exposed zebrafish amid a school of 'sober' peers.
Alcohol has also been shown to decrease inhibitory behavior in zebrafish.
The increased speed may therefore also reflect a heightened interest in interacting with shoalmates.
Regardless, this deviation from expected behavior is highly significant, as it points to the ability of social stimuli (the untreated shoalmates) to change an individual's response to alcohol.
The ability of alcohol-exposed zebrafish to influence untreated shoalmates may constitute a form of leadership, but researchers caution that aggressive, risk-taking behaviors—common under the disinhibitory effects of alcohol— may resemble leadership behavior patterns in this species.
The researchers said the study could have important implications for alcohol consumption in humans
Porfiri and his team believe that the methodology developed for these experiments holds tremendous promise for future studies on the social determinants of individual responses to alcohol.
By dissociating sociality from exposure, the researchers were able to study, for the first time in this species, how the impact of alcohol on behavior can be shaped by social environments.
Future studies will focus on determining the degree to which social influence exerted by exposed or unexposed individuals is affected by group size.
Ultimately, the researchers hold that this line of inquiry may advance understanding of how social interactions magnify or mitigate negative effects of alcohol abuse, such as destructive behavior, and could lead to therapies to reduce the same.
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