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Abstract

Foraging represents an ideal paradigm to study decision making as it is universal and subject to high selective pressure.
While foraging, animals have to decide between staying local and depleting known food sources and exploring for distant
sources in order to replenish them. This so-called exploitation-exploration dilemma also encompasses a trade-off in allocation
of attentional, sensory and motor resources. In constant environments a wide range of species exhibit spontaneous
fluctuations in exploitation or exploration states (Flavell et al., 2013; Martin, Ernst, & Heisenberg, 1999, Marques et al., 2020).
To better understand the effect of environmental sensory stimuli on the neural dynamics that underly exploitation-exploration
transitions, we developed a microfluidic system for freely behaving zebrafish larvae that allows for 1) temporally precise
control of prey density, 2) large field of view behavioral imaging with high spatial and temporal resolution, and 3) whole-brain
cellular resolution neural imaging. We observe that changes in environmental prey density alter the balance between
exploitation and exploration states, overriding intrinsic oscillations in internal brain state. This may represent a mechanism to
optimize foraging in the face of changing environments.