A Synthetic Maternal-Effect Selfish Genetic Element Drives Population Replacement in Drosophila
Abstract
One proposed strategy for controlling the transmission of insect-borne pathogens uses a drive mechanism to ensure the rapid spread of transgenes conferring disease refractoriness throughout wild populations. Here, we report the creation of maternal-effect selfish genetic elements in Drosophila that drive population replacement and are resistant to recombination-mediated dissociation of drive and disease refractoriness functions. These selfish elements use microRNA-mediated silencing of a maternally expressed gene essential for embryogenesis, which is coupled with early zygotic expression of a rescuing transgene.
- Publication:
-
Science
- Pub Date:
- April 2007
- DOI:
- 10.1126/science.1138595
- Bibcode:
- 2007Sci...316..597C
- Keywords:
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- GENETICS