Scholarly Literature

This is a database of scholarly literature that concentrates currently on natural and engineered selfish genetic elements (gene drives).  The latest are shown here.
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Engineering Resilient Gene Drives Towards Sustainable Malaria Control: Predicting, Testing and Overcoming Target Site Resistance

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Ioanna Morianou, Lee Phillimore, Bhavin S. Khatri,,  bioRxiv,  2024.
CRISPR-based gene drives are selfish genetic elements with the potential to spread through entire insect populations for sustainable vector control. Gene drives designed to disrupt the reproductive capacity of females can suppress laboratory populations of the malaria mosquito. ...

Pest control gets the CRISPR treatment

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Seydel, C.,  Nature Biotechnology,  2024.
In June 2024, the St. Louis–based pest control company Agragene released genetically modified fruit flies on berry farms in California and Oregon, moving the technology out of the laboratory and into contained field testing. The trial marked a milestone for a next-generation ...

Parental-effect gene-drive elements under partial selfing, or why do Caenorhabditis genomes have hyperdivergent regions?

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Matthew V Rockman,  Genetics,  2024.
Self-fertile Caenorhabditis nematodes carry a surprising number of Medea elements, alleles that act in heterozygous mothers and cause death or developmental delay in offspring that don’t inherit them. At some loci, both alleles in a cross operate as independent Medeas, ...

Stalk-eyed flies carrying a driving X chromosome compensate by increasing fight intensity

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Kimberly A. Paczolt, Macy E. Pritchard, Gabrielle T. Welsh, et al.,  Frontiers in Ethology,  3. 2024.
Exaggerated ornaments provide opportunities to understand how selection can operate at different levels to shape the evolution of a trait. While these features aid their bearer in attracting mates or fending off competitors, they can also be costly and influenced by the ...

Wolbachia Invasion in Mosquitoes with Incomplete CI, Imperfect Maternal Transmission and Maturation Delay

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Ma X, Su Y,  Bulletin of Mathematical Biology,  2024.
The mechanism of cytoplasmic incompatibility (CI) is important in the study of Wolbachia invasion in wild mosquitoes. Su et al. (Bull Math Biol 84(9):95, 2022) proposed a delay differential equation model by relating the CI effect to maturation delay. In this paper, we ...

Wolbachia-based emerging strategies for control of vector-transmitted disease

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Diego Montenegro, Gerardo Cortés-Cortés, María Guadalupe Balbuena-Alonso, et al.,  Acta Tropica,  260. 2024.
Dengue fever is a mosquito-transmitted disease of great public health importance. Dengue lacks adequate vaccine protection and insecticide-based methods of mosquito control are proving increasingly ineffective. Here we review the emerging use of mosquitoes transinfected with the ...

The potential of gene drives in malaria vector species to control malaria in African environments

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Hancock, P.A., North, A., Leach, A.W. et al.,  Nature Communications,  15. 2024.
Gene drives are a promising means of malaria control with the potential to cause sustained reductions in transmission. In real environments, however, their impacts will depend on local ecological and epidemiological factors. We develop a data-driven model to investigate the ...

Practical Application of a Relationship-Based Model to Engagement for Gene-Drive Vector Control Programs

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Ana Kormos, Lodney Nazaré, Adionilde Aguiar dos Santos, and Gregory C. Lanzaro,  The American Journal of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene,  111:341-360. 2024.
Engagement is an important component in the advancement of gene-drive vector control research programs as developers look to transition the technology from the laboratory to the field. As research advances and engagement surrounding this novel technology is put into practice, ...

Identification of novel genes responsible for a pollen killer present in local natural populations of Arabidopsis thaliana

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Anthony Ricou, Matthieu Simon, et al.,  bioRxiv,  2024.
Certain genetic elements are qualified as selfish because they favor their transmission to the progeny during reproduction to the detriment of gametes that do not carry them. These elements are widespread in fungi as well as in plants or in animals, and they are made up of two or ...

Evolutionary modes of wtf meiotic driver genes in Schizosaccharomyces pombe

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Yan-Hui Xu, Fang Suo, Xiao-Ran Zhang, et al.,  Genome Biology and Evolution,  2024.
Killer meiotic drivers (KMDs) are a class of selfish genetic elements that bias inheritance in their favor by destroying meiotic progeny that do not carry them. How KMDs evolve is not well understood. In the fission yeast Schizosaccharomyces pombe, the largest gene family, known ...

Fluorescent-based sex-separation technique in major invasive crop pest, Drosophila suzukii

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Junru Liu, Danny Rayes, Minzhe Yang, Omar S. Akbari,  bioRxiv,  2024.
Insect population biocontrol methods such as the sterile insect technique (SIT), represent promising alternatives to traditional pesticide-based control applications. To use these strategies efficiently requires scalable sex separation techniques which are currently lacking in ...

Evaluation of Wolbachia infection in Aedes aegypti suggests low prevalence and highly heterogeneous distribution in Medellín, Colombia

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rley Calle-Tobón, Raúl Rojo-Ospina, et al.,  Acta Tropica,  260. 2024.
Dengue virus, transmitted mainly by Aedes aegypti mosquitoes, is a significant public health challenge in tropical and subtropical countries, with an incidence that is growing at an alarming rate. The release of Wolbachia-carrying mosquitoes has been suggested as a strategy to ...

Loss-of-function in testis-specific serine/threonine protein kinase triggers male infertility in an invasive moth

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Wei, Z., Wang, Y., Zheng, K. et al.,  Communications Biology,  7. 2024.
Genetic biocontrol technologies present promising and eco-friendly strategies for the management of pest and insect-transmitted diseases. Although considerable advancements achieve in gene drive applications targeting mosquitoes, endeavors to combat agricultural pests have been ...

Gene Drive and Symbiont Technologies for Control of Mosquito-Borne Diseases

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Guan-Hong Wang, Ary Hoffmann, and Jackson Champer,  Annual Review of Entomology,  70. 2024.
Mosquito-borne diseases, such as dengue and malaria, pose a significant burden to global health. Current control strategies with insecticides are only moderately effective. Scalable solutions are needed to reduce the transmission risk of these diseases. Symbionts and genome ...

Assessment of drive efficiency and resistance allele formation of a homing gene drive in the mosquito Aedes aegypti

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Xiaozhen Yang, Xuejiao Xu, et al.,  bioRxiv,  2024.
Aedes aegypti, known for transmitting viruses such as dengue, zika, and yellow fever, poses a significant public health threat. Conventional insecticides give rise to a range of issues, including ecological contamination and insect resistance. Hence, there is a pressing demand ...

Wolbachia infection in Aedes aegypti does not affect its vectorial capacity for Dirofilaria immitis

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Shirozu, T., Regilme, M.A.F., Ote, M. et al.,  Scientific Reports,  14. 2024.
Mosquito-borne diseases such as dengue and filariasis are a growing public health concern in endemic countries. Biological approaches, such as the trans-infection of Wolbachia pipientis in mosquitoes, are an alternative vector control strategy, especially for arthropod-borne ...

Stable introduction of Wolbachia wPip into invasive Anopheles stephensi for potential malaria control

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Yongkang Liang, Julian Liu, et al.,  PLoS Neglected Tropical Diseases,  2024.
Recent efforts have successfully utilized the endosymbiotic bacterium Wolbachia to control mosquito-transmitted viral diseases like dengue in multiple countries. However, similar initiatives have been limited in combating malaria, the most devastating and deadly mosquito-borne ...

Current status of the sterile insect technique for the suppression of mosquito populations on a global scale

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Bouyer, J.,  Infectious Diseases of Poverty,  13. 2024.
The World Health Organization (WHO) has emphasized the urgent need for alternative strategies to chemical insecticides for controlling mosquito populations, particularly the invasive Aedes species, which are known vectors of arboviruses. Among these alternative approaches, the ...

Communicating the uncertainties associated with genetic biocontrol approaches: insights from communicators, science journalists and scientists in Africa

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Tonui, W. K., Ogoyi, D., Thuo, C., Tareh, C., et al.,  Journal of Science Communication,  23. 2024.
Genetic biocontrol approaches, such as gene drive technology is rapidly gaining interest from scientists and public health professionals due to their potential to overcome many challenges of current malaria control tools and strategies. This is particularly the case in Africa ...

To CRISPR or Not to CRISPR? Ethical Considerations in Gene-Editing Insects

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Brendan Parent, Meghan Barrett,  American Entomologist,  70:54-57. 2024.
Genetically modified corn has helped feed the world (Hernandes-Lopes et al. 2023). Genetically modified mosquitoes could help eliminate devastating diseases like malaria (Hammond and Galizi 2017). Plainly, gene editing can serve some important human interests. Still, many people ...

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