If you’ve ever dealt with a dog, you’ve probably experienced the following situation: You’re sitting by a pool on a hot summer day, you throw a stick at your four-legged friend, and it brings it back to you. Then he comes as close as possible to you and drenches you from head to toe with a vigorous shake.
Researchers have finally discovered why dogs shake when they are wet. According to a new study, the “wet dog shake” is caused by a receptor in mammalian skin called C-LTMR. It causes furry animals, from dogs to cats and mice, to perform a surprisingly constant shaking when drops of water touch the back of their necks.
“It’s complicated behavior. “Regardless of individual or species, animals tend to shake at the same frequency and with a similar pattern of movements—typically three back and forth movements each time—and no one knew which receptors and nerves were responsible,” said Dawei Zhang, co-author of the study, and PhD candidate at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute at Harvard Medical School.
“It’s complicated behavior”
New genetic tools allowed Zhang and colleagues to discover the cause of the shaking, but identifying the “culprit” required detective work. The researchers first created genetic mutations in mice to disable either the channels in skin receptors that detect mechanical forces or those that detect temperature changes.
They found that mice that could not detect temperature changes continued to shake when drops of oil were sprinkled on the back of their necks. In contrast, mice without mechanoreceptor channels did not shake.
Thus, the team focused on mechano-receptors, following their activity in response to oil droplets. They narrowed the search down to three receivers that react to very light touches. They then used a technique called optogenetics to activate specific receptors on the skin with light, triggering individual types of nerves without liquid stimuli, according to LiveScience.
The results were as clear as can be!
The results were clear: When the researchers stimulated a type of nerve called C-fiber low-threshold mechanoreceptors (C-LTMRs), the mice shook as if suddenly drenched. For confirmation, the researchers genetically engineered mice without C-LTMR and found that they shook 58 percent less than normal mice when water was sprinkled on the back of their necks.
“It is difficult to correlate whether this behavior is an evolutionary product of mice or other furry animals, such as the typical wet dog shaking. Maybe it is, maybe it isn’t,” Zhang said.
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Source: www.descopera.ro
