A CRISPR–Cas9 gene drive targeting doublesex causes complete population suppression in caged Anopheles gambiae mosquitoes
Kyros Kyrou,Andrew Hammond,Roberto Galizi,Nace Kranjc,Austin Burt,Andrea Beaghton,Tony Nolan,Andrea Crisanti +7 more
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TLDR
It is found that CRISPR–Cas9-targeted disruption of the intron 4–exon 5 boundary aimed at blocking the formation of functional AgdsxF did not affect male development or fertility, whereas females homozygous for the disrupted allele showed an intersex phenotype and complete sterility.Abstract:
In the human malaria vector Anopheles gambiae, the gene doublesex (Agdsx) encodes two alternatively spliced transcripts, dsx-female (AgdsxF) and dsx-male (AgdsxM), that control differentiation of the two sexes. The female transcript, unlike the male, contains an exon (exon 5) whose sequence is highly conserved in all Anopheles mosquitoes so far analyzed. We found that CRISPR-Cas9-targeted disruption of the intron 4-exon 5 boundary aimed at blocking the formation of functional AgdsxF did not affect male development or fertility, whereas females homozygous for the disrupted allele showed an intersex phenotype and complete sterility. A CRISPR-Cas9 gene drive construct targeting this same sequence spread rapidly in caged mosquitoes, reaching 100% prevalence within 7-11 generations while progressively reducing egg production to the point of total population collapse. Owing to functional constraint of the target sequence, no selection of alleles resistant to the gene drive occurred in these laboratory experiments. Cas9-resistant variants arose in each generation at the target site but did not block the spread of the drive.read more
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Super-Mendelian inheritance mediated by CRISPR-Cas9 in the female mouse germline.
Hannah A. Grunwald,Valentino M. Gantz,Gunnar Poplawski,Gunnar Poplawski,Xiang-Ru S. Xu,Ethan Bier,Kimberly L. Cooper +6 more
TL;DR: The results demonstrate the feasibility of CRISPR–Cas9-mediated systems that bias inheritance of desired alleles in mice and that have the potential to transform the use of rodent models in basic and biomedical research.
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The insect apocalypse, and why it matters.
TL;DR: Terrestrial and freshwater ecosystems will collapse without insects, and studies from Germany and Puerto Rico are a warning that the authors may have failed to appreciate the full scale and pace of environmental degradation caused by human activities in the Anthropocene.
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Transforming insect population control with precision guided sterile males with demonstration in flies.
TL;DR: A novel CRISPR-based technology and SIT are integrated to develop a precision guided SIT (pgSIT), and its proof-of-principle is demonstrated by generating 100% sterile males.
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The potential of genomics for restoring ecosystems and biodiversity.
Martin F. Breed,Peter A. Harrison,Colette Blyth,Margaret Byrne,Virginie Gaget,Nicholas J. C. Gellie,Scott V. C. Groom,Riley Hodgson,Jacob G. Mills,Thomas A. A. Prowse,Dorothy A. Steane,Jakki J. Mohr +11 more
TL;DR: It is argued that genomics tools need to be adopted in restoration ecology to help reverse the environmental destruction caused by humans.
Journal ArticleDOI
A male-biased sex-distorter gene drive for the human malaria vector Anopheles gambiae
Alekos Simoni,Andrew Hammond,Andrew Hammond,Andrea Beaghton,Roberto Galizi,Roberto Galizi,Chrysanthi Taxiarchi,Kyros Kyrou,Dario Meacci,Matthew Gribble,Giulia Morselli,Austin Burt,Tony Nolan,Tony Nolan,Andrea Crisanti,Andrea Crisanti +15 more
TL;DR: A male-biased sex-distorter gene drive (SDGD) is reported in the human malaria vector Anopheles gambiae and is predicted to have a quicker impact on female mosquito populations than previously developed gene drives targeting female fertility.
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