Murine pheromone proteins constitute a context-dependent combinatorial code governing multiple social behaviors.
During social interactions, an individual's behavior is largely governed by the subset of signals emitted by others. Discrimination of "self" from "other" regulates the territorial urine countermarking behavior of mice. To identify the cues for this social discrimination and understand how they are interpreted, we designed an olfactory-dependent countermarking assay. We find major urinary proteins (MUPs) sufficient to elicit countermarking, and unlike other vomeronasal ligands that are detected by specifically tuned sensory neurons, MUPs are detected by a combinatorial strategy. A chemosensory signature of "self" that modulates behavior is developed via experience through exposure to a repertoire of MUPs. In contrast, aggression can be elicited by MUPs in an experience-independent but context-dependent manner. These findings reveal that individually emitted chemical cues can be interpreted based on their combinatorial permutation and relative ratios, and they can transmit both fixed and learned information to promote multiple behaviors.
Department of Molecular and Cellular Neuroscience, The Scripps Research Institute, La Jolla, CA 92037, USA.
Angeldeep W
AW
Kaur
Department of Chemosensation, Institute for Biology II, RWTH Aachen University, 52074 Aachen, Germany.
Tobias
T
Ackels
Department of Molecular and Cellular Neuroscience, The Scripps Research Institute, La Jolla, CA 92037, USA.
Tsung-Han
TH
Kuo
Department of Chemosensation, Institute for Biology II, RWTH Aachen University, 52074 Aachen, Germany.
Annika
A
Cichy
Department of Molecular and Cellular Neuroscience, The Scripps Research Institute, La Jolla, CA 92037, USA.
Sandeepa
S
Dey
Department of Molecular and Cellular Neuroscience, The Scripps Research Institute, La Jolla, CA 92037, USA.
Cristen
C
Hays
Institute of Statistics, RWTH Aachen University, 52056 Aachen, Germany.
Maria
M
Kateri
Department of Molecular and Cellular Neuroscience, The Scripps Research Institute, La Jolla, CA 92037, USA; Welcome Trust Sanger Institute, Hinxton, Cambridge CB10 1HH, UK.
Darren W
DW
Logan
Department of Molecular and Cellular Neuroscience, The Scripps Research Institute, La Jolla, CA 92037, USA; Department of Psychiatry, University of California, San Francisco, San Francisco, CA 94143, USA.
Tobias F
TF
Marton
Department of Chemosensation, Institute for Biology II, RWTH Aachen University, 52074 Aachen, Germany.
Marc
M
Spehr
Department of Molecular and Cellular Neuroscience, The Scripps Research Institute, La Jolla, CA 92037, USA. Electronic address: stowers@scripps.edu.
Lisa
L
Stowers
D000818:Animals; D005260:Female; D008024:Ligands; D008297:Male; D051379:Mice / Q000502:physiology*; D008807:Mice, Inbred BALB C; D008810:Mice, Inbred C57BL; D010675:Pheromones / Q000032:analysis* / Q000378:metabolism*; D011506:Proteins / Q000032:analysis* / Q000378:metabolism*; D012919:Social Behavior
D008024:Ligands; D010675:Pheromones; D011506:Proteins; C035737:major urinary proteins