| First Author | Kuwaki T | Year | 2021 |
| Journal | Commun Biol | Volume | 4 |
| Issue | 1 | Pages | 165 |
| PubMed ID | 33547399 | Mgi Jnum | J:306674 |
| Mgi Id | MGI:6714936 | Doi | 10.1038/s42003-021-01696-z |
| Citation | Kuwaki T, et al. (2021) Sexual excitation induces courtship ultrasonic vocalizations and cataplexy-like behavior in orexin neuron-ablated male mice. Commun Biol 4(1):165 |
| abstractText | Cataplexy is triggered by laughter in humans and palatable food in mice. To further evaluate mice's cataplexy, we examined courtship behavior in orexin neuron-ablated mice (ORX-AB), one of the animal models of narcolepsy/cataplexy. Wild-type female mice were placed into the home cage of male ORX-AB and cataplexy-like behavior was observed along with ultrasonic vocalizations (USVs), also known as the "love song". ORX-AB with a female encounter showed cataplexy-like behavior both during the dark and light periods, whereas ORX-AB with chocolate predominantly showed it during the dark period. During the light period observation, more than 85% of cataplexy-like bouts were preceded by USVs. A strong positive correlation was observed between the number of USVs and cataplexy-like bouts. Cataplexy-like behavior in narcoleptic mice is a good behavioral measure to study the brain mechanisms behind positive emotion because they can be induced by different kinds of positive stimuli, including chocolate and female courtship. |
