Zebrafish models of anxiety-like behaviors

Anxiety disorders are widespread psychiatric illnesses affecting approximately 7-10 % of the global population. Zebrafish are a particularly useful animal model for studying anxiety-related phenotypes. They are increasingly utilized for studying neurobiological, physiological and genetic mechanisms of anxiety, as well as for screening various anxiolytic drugs. Summarized here, accumulating evidence supports the utility of zebrafish neurobehavioral phenotyping in studying anxiety and stress neurobiology. For example, zebrafish are highly sensitive to various anxiety-evoking environmental stressors, including novelty, predator exposure, alarm pheromone, anxiogenic drugs, and drug withdrawal. Zebrafish also show high sensitivity to anxiolytic manipulations. Zebrafish anxiety-related neuroendocrine responses are also robust, sensitive, and correlate strongly (and bi-directionally) with behavioral endpoints. Finally, zebrafish are also amenable to genetic manipulations, and differences in baseline and experimentally-evoked anxiety levels can be observed in different strains of zebrafish. Collectively, this supports the validity and efficiency of both larval and adult zebrafish model for studying acute and chronic anxiety-like states.