Abstract The New World screwworm and the Australian sheep blowfly Lucilia cuprina are
devastating pests of livestock. The larvae of these species feed on the tissue of the living
animal and can cause death if untreated. The sterile insect technique or SIT was used to
eradicate screwworm from North and Central America. This inspired efforts to develop
strains containing complex chromosomal rearrangements for genetic control of L. cuprina in
Australia. Although one field trial was promising, the approach was abandoned due to costs�…

Background The sterile insect technique (SIT) has been successfully used in many pest
management programs worldwide. Some SIT programs release both sexes due to the lack
of genetic sexing strains or efficient sex separation methods but sterile females are
ineffective control agents. Transgenic sexing strains (TSS) using the tetracycline-off control
system have been developed in a variety of insect pests, from which females die by either of
two commonly used lethal effectors: overexpression of the transcription factor tetracycline�…