Osborne, K.A., Robichon, A., Burgess, E., Butland, S., Shaw, R.A., Coulthard, A., Pereira, H.S., Greenspan, R.J., Sokolowski, M.B. (1997). Natural behavior polymorphism due to a cGMP-dependent protein kinase of Drosophila.  Science 277(5327): 834--836.

FBrf0096020

Research paper

Naturally occuring polymorphisms in behavior are difficult to map genetically and thus are refractory to molecular characterization. An exception is the foraging gene (for), a gene that has two naturally occurring variants in Drosophila melanogaster food-search behavior: rover and sitter. Molecular mapping placed for mutations in the dg2 gene, which encodes a cyclic guanosine monophosphate (cGMP)-dependent protein kinase (PKG). Rovers had higher PKG activity than sitters, and transgenic sitters expressing a dg2 complementary DNA from rover showed transformation of behavior to rover. Thus, PKG levels affected food-search behavior, and natural variation in PKG activity accounted for a behavioral polymorphism.