title: A mutant exhibiting abnormal habituation behavior in Caenorhabditis elegans.
abstract: The acquisition and retention of information by the nervous system are major processes of learning. Habituation is a simple learning process that occurs during repeated exposure to harmless stimuli. C. elegans is habituated when repeatedly given mechanical stimuli and recover from the habituation when the stimuli are stopped. A habituation abnormal mutant was isolated and assigned to a new gene hab-1 whose mutation causes slow habituation. The hab-1 mutant phenotype is remarkable at short time interval stimuli. However, hab-1 mutant worms show normal dishabituation. Ablations of neurons constituting the neural circuit for mechanical reflexes did not abolish abnormalities caused by the hab-1 mutation.
authors.affiliation: Department of Physical Information, Faculty of Medicine, Kanazawa University, Ishikawa, Japan.
authors.forename: Xizhen
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Xu
authors.forename: Toshihiro
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Sassa
authors.forename: Kiyoshi
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Kunoh
authors.forename: Ryuji
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Hosono
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D017173:Caenorhabditis elegans / Q000235:genetics / Q000502:physiology*; D006185:Habituation, Psychophysiologic / Q000235:genetics*; D008959:Models, Neurological; D009154:Mutation; D009415:Nerve Net / Q000502:physiology; D009474:Neurons / Q000502:physiology; D010812:Physical Stimulation / Q000379:methods; D012018:Reflex / Q000502:physiology; D014110:Touch