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Field performance of engineered male mosquitoes

Harris, Angela F., Nimmo, Derric, McKemey, Andrew R., Kelly, Nick, Scaife, Sarah, Donnelly, Christl A., Beech, Camilla, Petrie, William D. and Alphey, Luke (2011) 'Field performance of engineered male mosquitoes'. Nature Biotechnology, Vol 29, Issue 11, pp. 967-1054.

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Abstract

Dengue is the most medically important arthropod-borne viral disease, with 50–100 million cases reported annually worldwide1. As no licensed vaccine or dedicated therapy exists for dengue, the most promising strategies to control the disease involve targeting the predominant mosquito vector, Aedes aegypti. However, the current methods to do this are inadequate. Various approaches involving genetically engineered mosquitoes have been proposed2–4, including the release of transgenic sterile males5–10. However, the ability of laboratory-reared, engineered male mosquitoes to effectively compete with wild males in terms of finding and mating with wild females, which is critical to the success of these strategies, has remained untested. We report data from the first open-field trial involving a strain of engineered mosquito. We demonstrated that genetically modified male mosquitoes, released across 10 hectares for a 4-week period, mated successfully with wild females and fertilized their eggs. These findings suggest the feasibility of this technology to control dengue by suppressing field populations of A. aegypti.

Item Type: Article
Subjects: QX Parasitology > Insects. Other Parasites > QX 525 Aedes
QX Parasitology > Insects. Other Parasites > QX 600 Insect control. Tick control
WC Communicable Diseases > Virus Diseases > Infectious Mononucleosis. Arbovirus Infections > WC 528 Dengue
Digital Object Identifer (DOI): https://doi.org/10.1038/nbt.2019
Depositing User: Users 183 not found.
Date Deposited: 18 Nov 2011 12:36
Last Modified: 25 Jan 2022 09:54
URI: https://archive.lstmed.ac.uk/id/eprint/2393

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