Serotonin Mediates Behavioral Gregarization Underlying Swarm Formation in Desert Locusts

@article{Anstey2009SerotoninMB,
  title={Serotonin Mediates Behavioral Gregarization Underlying Swarm Formation in Desert Locusts},
  author={Michael L. Anstey and Stephen M Rogers and Swidbert R. Ott and Malcolm Burrows and Stephen James Simpson},
  journal={Science},
  year={2009},
  volume={323},
  pages={627 - 630}
}
Desert locusts, Schistocerca gregaria, show extreme phenotypic plasticity, transforming between a little-seen solitarious phase and the notorious swarming gregarious phase depending on population density. An essential tipping point in the process of swarm formation is the initial switch from strong mutual aversion in solitarious locusts to coherent group formation and greater activity in gregarious locusts. We show here that serotonin, an evolutionarily conserved mediator of neuronal plasticity… 
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There is emerging evidence that the neuronal mechanisms underlying this transformation in locusts show similarities with those underlying social behaviours in other animals, and this analysis of phase change provides insights into a feedback circuit between the environment and the neurobiology of social interaction.
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