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Controlling mosquitos with a gene drive that makes females infertile:
We've known for a long time that we can limit malaria infections by controlling the mosquitos that transmit them. But that knowledge hasn't translated into control efforts that have always been completely successful. Many of the approaches we've used to control mosquitos have caused environmental problems, and mosquito populations are large enough that they have evolved resistance to many of our pesticides.
That made the development of what are called "gene drive" constructs exciting (if a bit scary). They have the potential to rapidly spread genes throughout a population—including a mosquito population. But the prospect of a modern genetic control of mosquito populations has run up against the very old problem of evolution, as the gene drives often stall due to genetic changes that allow mosquito populations to escape their impact.
Now, a team has figured out a way that might avoid this problem: use gene drive to target a gene that's fundamental to how mosquitos develop as male or female. In doing so, it makes the females sterile and, at least in the lab, causes mosquito populations to collapse.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Friday September 28 2018, @05:35AM
Mosquitos Are Evolving Resistance to the CRISPR/Gene Drive Technique [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday September 28 2018, @06:42AM (2 children)
i dislike mosquitoes as much as the next guy errr... person but mosquitoes dont only drink blood. before being fertilized both sexes acctually live from nectar from plants, which, it seems, the plant make and "give away free" for a reason.
ofc mosquitoes are also great as a natural SA used with zonening laws to deter development of swamp land until some elite off spring needs a steady income in the form of a housing estate ... other cheap mechanisms in the SA (later) SS arsenal of corrupt and repressive "governments" are tolarance of unruly youth, a love for mangy diseased dogs living on the public roads, unilateral sanctioned smear campaigns and taking away free things only to give it back to appear generous ..
(*) maybe one has to close one eye when reading the title ; )
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday September 28 2018, @06:53AM (1 child)
Get that through your heads.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday September 28 2018, @03:52PM
Depends on your perspective. From my point of view all sunlight is free.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by shrewdsheep on Friday September 28 2018, @08:38AM (4 children)
Sigh, ... they seem to be able to only remember one sentence at a time.
Yes, this is exactly where the previous efforts were, and also where their effectiveness stopped. Genetic modifications can only be successful if they convey a reproductive advantage not a disadvantage. The only way would therefore be to couple any such advantage with a sensitivity to some drug/substance. Then wait for the modification to spread and then strike with one swift stroke. Enjoy a couple of mosquito free years and restart the process thereafter when a resistant subpopulation has recovered in numbers.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by VLM on Friday September 28 2018, @11:34AM (2 children)
I think they're going for the smallpox level of effectiveness. Kind of like shooting buffalo a bit more than a century ago didn't result in the evolution of naturally bullet-proof buffalo hides.
Also there's a lot of mosquito species competing with each other and disease carrying effectiveness varies widely. So nuking all the malaria mosquitoes from orbit doesn't mean they return years later to an empty niche.
(Score: 1) by shrewdsheep on Friday September 28 2018, @02:16PM
You cannot achieve that through genetic manipulation of a subpopulation. I give you that after H-bombing, say, all of the Americas on a very small grid, there will not be any mosquitos left on said continent, nor will they magically reappear unless imported.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 12 2018, @01:28PM
I thought the idea was to convey an advantage to the males, while killing the females.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday September 28 2018, @05:10PM
Or, introduce some trait which simultaneously makes them more likely to survive, and less of a pest to humans :)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday September 28 2018, @09:11AM (3 children)
What is the projected effect on other species that eat mosquitos and their larvae? Frogs, birds, spiders, bats?
(Score: 2) by VLM on Friday September 28 2018, @11:30AM (2 children)
Phrased wrong in that I'm not aware of any mosquito specific predators that aren't perfectly happy when the lack of mosquito larvae means 10% more equally delicious housefly larvae in the same ecological niche.
With a side dish of people are more important than frogs, so even if the world frog population declined 5%, that would be worth it to prevent millions of malaria deaths per year.
Kind of like how people can get annoyed about windmills killing birds, then drive by a coal power plant on the way to dinner at KFC. It would be nice if windmills didn't kill birds, but since every other possible alternative is worse, and they are, after all, just birds...
(Score: 2) by PinkyGigglebrain on Friday September 28 2018, @06:12PM (1 child)
Ever seen a orb weavers spider web?
Beautiful are they not?
Now, break a single thread. Depending on which one you pick the result can range from being barely noticeable to the near total collapse of the web.
Which thread is the mosquito?
"Beware those who would deny you Knowledge, For in their hearts they dream themselves your Master."
(Score: 2) by VLM on Friday September 28 2018, @07:03PM
Yeah the problem with that analogy is species go extinct all the time. Even big stuff like passenger pigeon or for all practical purposes the buffalo. I think we'll be fine without some bloodsuckers.
One way to look at it, is no ecology has a wild improvement via random swarms of random mosquitoes. Nobody AFAIK ever said "This place is ecologically dead until we seed it with mosquitoes"
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Friday September 28 2018, @09:55AM (3 children)
the best thing would be to modify them so they don't bite humans anymore. they can bite other animals all they like.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by kiffer on Friday September 28 2018, @11:11AM (1 child)
This was my understanding of the general goal.
Rather than use a chemical to basically kill all the insects in an area you only target the ones that bite people.
You don't waste time and money to remove non-problem insects.
You wouldn't even have to remove all human biting mosquitoes,
only the species that carry malaria... if that's an option.
Then you hope that other types take up their niches feeding birds, fertilizing plants... what ever.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday September 28 2018, @11:22PM
Could they modify that chemical so that we could target Muslims who are jihadis? Then we could spray all the Muslims, the jihadis would die and the good ones would get to live. More humane than our current methods of Muslim control.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Immerman on Friday September 28 2018, @02:40PM
There's *lots* of species of mosquitoes. As I recall only one or two of them target humans, with the dominant people-biter being an invasive organism that has spread across the globe thanks to modern transportation systems. If we could successfully eliminate just that species (as a gene drive is intended to do) we'd actually be restoring ecological niches to the native, non-people-biting mosquitoes and other nectar-feeders. I see absolutely no reasoin to object to the *goal*.
The *strategy* they're considering on the other hand...
All those other species of mosquito are also so many different possibilities for successful cross-breeding, allowing the gene drive to spread into other species. Interspecies breeding is only *mostly* unviable, the genetic boundaries between species are often not quite as uncrossable as they teach in high school biology. There's no telling where they might stop. And gene drives can't be reliably eliminated once released, except by the extinction of the species. At best they could be replaced with another "benign" gene drive - and then you have permanently bestowed the "infected" species with cutting-edge microbial gene-editing technology. And evolution does so love to put useful genes to work...
(Score: 2) by suburbanitemediocrity on Friday September 28 2018, @09:00PM
of Mosquitoes
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday September 28 2018, @11:18PM
Sure would help keep DoD budget under control if it did...