Base Recording: A Technique for Analyzing Responses of Taste Neurons in Drosophila

Insects taste the external world through taste hairs, or sensilla, that have pores at their tips. When a sensillum comes into contact with a potential food source, compounds from the food source enter through the pore and activate neurons within. For over 50 years, these responses have been recorded using a technique called tip recording. However, this method has major limitations, including the inability to measure neural activity before or after stimulus contact and the requirement for tastants to be soluble in aqueous solutions. We describe here a technique that we call base recording, which overcomes these limitations. Base recording allows the measurement of taste neuron activity before, during, and after the stimulus. Thus, it allows extensive analysis of OFF responses that occur after a taste stimulus. It can be used to study hydrophobic compounds such as long-chain pheromones that have very low solubility in water. In summary, base recording offers the advantages of single-sensillum electrophysiology as a means of measuring neuronal activity - high spatial and temporal resolution, without the need for genetic tools - and overcomes key limitations of the traditional tip recording technique.