Fig. 4: Connectivity changes in dauer neurons are correlated with unique behavior in dauer.

a EM cross-section view (left) and 3D volumetric reconstructions of presynaptic and postsynaptic neurons (middle) at the location of IL2-RIG contact (right, contact area marked as white) in adult-2 (top row) and dauer (bottom row). b Fluorescence images of IL2 neurons and GRASP signal in adult (top) and dauer (bottom) stages. IL2 neurons were marked with mCherry using F28A12.3 promoter. Split GFP11 was tagged with IL2 neurons using F28A12.3 promoter, and split GFP1-10 were tagged with RIG neurons using twk-3 promoter. c RIG ablated lines show significantly lower nictation ratio than N2 (individual nictation test; n = 49; two-sided unpaired t-test; ***p = 1.8×10^-5). d RIG-activated cha-1 mutants exhibit significantly higher nictation ratio than cha-1 mutants (individual nictation test; n = 40; two-sided unpaired t-test; ***p = 4.9×10^-5). e RIG-activated daf-2;daf-10 mutants exhibit significantly higher nictation ratio than daf-2;daf-10 mutants (individual nictation test; n = 38; two-sided unpaired t-test; **p = 0.0016). a Scale bars: 500 nm (EM images) and 1 μm (3D views), asterisk: active zone. b Scale bars: 1 μm. c-e Orange line: median, box: interquartile range, whiskers: 5th and 95th percentiles.