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. 2019 Sep 10;9(1):13047.
doi: 10.1038/s41598-019-49660-6.

Transgenic Aedes aegypti Mosquitoes Transfer Genes into a Natural Population

Benjamin R Evans  1 , Panayiota Kotsakiozi  1 , Andre Luis Costa-da-Silva  2   3 , Rafaella Sayuri Ioshino  2   3 , Luiza Garziera  3 , Michele C Pedrosa  2   3   4 , Aldo Malavasi  4 , Jair F Virginio  4 , Margareth L Capurro  2   3 , Jeffrey R Powell  5
Affiliations

Transgenic Aedes aegypti Mosquitoes Transfer Genes into a Natural Population

Benjamin R Evans et al. Sci Rep. .

Expression of concern in

Abstract

In an attempt to control the mosquito-borne diseases yellow fever, dengue, chikungunya, and Zika fevers, a strain of transgenically modified Aedes aegypti mosquitoes containing a dominant lethal gene has been developed by a commercial company, Oxitec Ltd. If lethality is complete, releasing this strain should only reduce population size and not affect the genetics of the target populations. Approximately 450 thousand males of this strain were released each week for 27 months in Jacobina, Bahia, Brazil. We genotyped the release strain and the target Jacobina population before releases began for >21,000 single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs). Genetic sampling from the target population six, 12, and 27-30 months after releases commenced provides clear evidence that portions of the transgenic strain genome have been incorporated into the target population. Evidently, rare viable hybrid offspring between the release strain and the Jacobina population are sufficiently robust to be able to reproduce in nature. The release strain was developed using a strain originally from Cuba, then outcrossed to a Mexican population. Thus, Jacobina Ae. aegypti are now a mix of three populations. It is unclear how this may affect disease transmission or affect other efforts to control these dangerous vectors. These results highlight the importance of having in place a genetic monitoring program during such releases to detect un-anticipated outcomes.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no competing interests.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Map of Jacobina. Ovitraps where samples were collected are indicated with colored dots, coded by neighborhood. Releases were made in the neighborhoods of Pedra Branca, Catuaba, and Inocoop but never in the Centro area. © OpenStreetMap contributors.
Figure 2
Figure 2
(A) Principal Components Analysis (PCA) on the OX513A release strain and three neighborhoods Jacobina (Centro and Catuaba/Pedra Branca) before releases began. (B) Hybrid index (h-index) as performed in INTROGRESS. An index of 1.0 indicates the “pure” OX513A individuals, 0.0 indicates the “pure” Jacobina pre-release individuals. Individuals are organized by neighborhood indicated at bottom of the figure, then by collection date: pre-release, 6, 12 or 27–30 months post release. Fluorescence verified F1 hybrids are grouped and labeled as F1. The horizontal dashed line represents cutoff (h-index = 0.02) the maximum observed pre-release. (C) ADMIXTURE analysis of all individual genotypes. Proportion of each color for each individual represents the proportion of that individual’s ancestry attributable to the red (OX513A) or blue (Jacobina pre-release) cluster.
Figure 3
Figure 3
Levels of DENV-2 (left) and ZIKV (right) genomic copies detected in heads and bodies without heads of Rockefeller, OX513 and Jacobina mosquitoes challenged via oral infection. None of the strains differ by Kruskal Wallis tests followed by Dunn’s post-test (p > 0.05). Experimental details in Supplementary Materials.
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