# Functional mechanisms of environmental control over social behavior

> **NIH NIH K99** · ROCKEFELLER UNIVERSITY · 2024 · $125,000

## Abstract

Project Summary
Environmental cues and signals are fundamental in the regulation of behavioral decision making. For decades
this aspect of social behavior has been a major focus of environmental psychology and neuropsychiatry
research. Yet the complexity of the mammalian nervous system and the lack of experimental traction in humans
has limited a mechanistic understanding of how environmental influences shape sensory processing and social
behavior. The goal of this proposal is to take advantage of the comparatively simple nervous system of
Drosophila to identify the functional neural basis of environmental control over social behaviors, which has the
potential to inform our understanding of devastating neuropsychiatric conditions characterized by the failure to
appropriately process social and other environmental cues. In my experimental approach I leverage the power
of striking natural variation in the environmental control over mating behaviors across species in a comparative
framework and combine it with the unparalleled neurogenetic toolkit of Drosophila to isolate causal neural circuit
mechanisms through which environmental cues control behavior.
In the mentored phase of this award, I will elucidate the functional integration of food odors with male courtship
circuits (Aim 1) and characterize how visual cues emitted by the social group regulate female copulation
decisions (Aim 2) using a combination of in vivo functional brain imaging in a multimodal virtual reality system,
optogenetics, and neuroanatomy approaches across two species with divergent behaviors. The comparison of
alternative circuit architectures underlying behavioral differences will allow me to isolate the circuit motifs and
dynamics that control the functional integration of these environmental cues with central mating circuits. For the
independent phase of the award, I will transfer the skills and techniques acquired during the training phase to
develop a new model for comparative neuroscience. This will allow me to elucidate the neuronal functional
principles underlying bacterial manipulations of the nervous system that alter the perception of environmental
signals and manipulate mating behavior of infected individuals in the bacteria’s favor (Aim 3).
The proposed professional development plan under the continued mentorship of Dr. Vanessa Ruta complements
my training in evolutionary biology, chemical ecology and systems neuroscience with the background and
techniques necessary to complete the proposed research and shed new light on the functional mechanisms of
environmental control over social behavior. To achieve these goals, I will take advantage of the extensive
resources of the Rockefeller University and my advisory committee, that will provide expert guidance in key
aspects of the project and career development. Together this will set me up optimally to successfully transition
to an independent position and start my own lab exploring the mechanisms underlying the sens...

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 10907011
- **Project number:** 5K99GM151471-02
- **Recipient organization:** ROCKEFELLER UNIVERSITY
- **Principal Investigator:** Philipp Brand
- **Activity code:** K99 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** NIH
- **Fiscal year:** 2024
- **Award amount:** $125,000
- **Award type:** 5
- **Project period:** 2023-09-01 → 2025-06-23

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/10907011

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 10907011, Functional mechanisms of environmental control over social behavior (5K99GM151471-02). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-05-24 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/10907011. Licensed CC0.

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