Genetic modification via parasitic wasp

September 18, 2015 3:03 PM

It's well understood that many species of parasitic wasp, when they lay their eggs on host caterpillars, also inject viruses that prevent the host's immune system from attacking the eggs. But it was recently discovered that some of those virus genes, as well as genes from parasitic wasps themselves, have become a part of the genome of some lepidopteran species (even protecting these species from a different type of virus), thus demonstrating horizontal gene transfer between insect species (link to paper).
posted by J.K. Seazer (23 comments total)

So you're saying that one day there will be an insect that floats like a butterfly, and stings like a bee?
posted by swift at 3:07 PM on September 18, 2015 [31 favorites]

Turn on the Blasd-signal, a parasitic conservation is a-brewin'
posted by aydeejones at 3:11 PM on September 18, 2015 [2 favorites]

Well I think it's irresponsible for these wasps to genetically modify caterpillars and they ought to come with a warning label
posted by prize bull octorok at 3:21 PM on September 18, 2015 [16 favorites]

Yeah, I'm going to hang onto my irrational distrust of GMO foodstuffs for the time being.
posted by bonobothegreat at 3:21 PM on September 18, 2015 [4 favorites]

I wanna stab stuff with my butt and genetically modify it!

Wasps get all the cool super powers... all we get is a stupid thinky brain...
posted by The Power Nap at 3:31 PM on September 18, 2015 [3 favorites]

And thumbs.
posted by notyou at 3:54 PM on September 18, 2015 [2 favorites]

That distant buzzing to the West (or very distant to the East if you're in Asia) you hear is the sound of 20th Century Fox screenwriters spinning up Alien sequel scripts.
posted by Joakim Ziegler at 4:15 PM on September 18, 2015

Since 90% of our own microbes are non-human i'd love to learn what all is inside us, how it got there and what it does if it serves any function. We have so many different bacteria, viruses and archaea knocking around in our DNA that surely some of them get spliced in and put to use. How has this affected our own evolution as a species? There have already been links found between disease vectors and parasites affecting autoimmune response. How does something like this affect mood? or decision making in humans? (see toxoplasmosis, tapeworms and allergies etc).
posted by Conrad-Casserole at 4:48 PM on September 18, 2015

he's saying virii are like patching machine code
posted by Fupped Duck at 4:59 PM on September 18, 2015 [1 favorite]

This is simply more proof that we need to annihilate all biological life on Earth so that its disgusting repulsive writhing mass of nightmare filth may be replaced with sharp-edged crystalline intellects of immeasurable purity.

And cleanliness. God, sooo much nice clean, smooth, clean pure shiny clean-ness. Crystal shiny smooth razor cleanliness.
posted by aramaic at 5:05 PM on September 18, 2015 [20 favorites]

We have so many different ... viruses ... knocking around in our DNA that surely some of them get spliced in and put to use. How has this affected our own evolution as a species?

A viral-origin protein has come to be necessary for the proper development of the human placenta (along with those of many other mammals). Without that protein, you would have probably died in the womb.
posted by cosmic.osmo at 5:06 PM on September 18, 2015 [8 favorites]

#CRISPRfacts - Wasps sued by Broad Institute
posted by benzenedream at 5:48 PM on September 18, 2015 [2 favorites]

Given that nature has produced so many lovely viruses and parasites already, only a few of which have proved adaptive and survived, I'm 100% sure human beings won't make a terrible cock of it!
posted by Miko at 8:20 PM on September 18, 2015

I'm 100% sure human beings won't make a terrible cock of it!

I'm now imagining a hideous, gigantic rooster made up of a writhing mass of parasites and viruses, screaming its rage across a cowering city. But would it be terrible or awesome?
posted by GenjiandProust at 3:01 AM on September 19, 2015 [2 favorites]

After carefully considering the options, I'm gonna go with aweribble.
posted by mediareport at 3:48 AM on September 19, 2015 [3 favorites]

The extremely cool thing about all this, if you apply the 'machine code' analogy, is that every living thing on Earth uses the same base (ho ho) instruction set. We are all compatible at the lowest level, and at many higher levels too. You'd think that there'd be room for something different that had an efficiency advantage in some way, in some circumstances, to co-exist, but if there is, we haven't found it yet.

This could mean that the DNA mechanism is simply the best there is and has out-competed anything else that has managed to come into being over the entire history of the bio-compatible Earth. It could mean that the sequence of events that produces capable, self-replicating systems of sufficient complexity is extremely rare full stop, or there really is only one way for it to happen. Or it could mean that the benefits of having a compatible system that does allow wholesale promiscuous gene swapping (think software components) are such that the first to get there, no matter what the underlying 'machine code', can out-evolve any or all competition well enough to always get the upper hand on resources, defend itself against attacks, or do whatever it takes to go the full Darwin. That is a tempting conclusion: it allows very separate kinds of organisms to form very close symbiotic, co-evolving relationships, with a subtlety that really blurs the symbiont/parasite/host/prey distinctions I for one grew up with as givens.

Any of those reasons is pretty mind-blowing for what it means about our history, existence and future, and if at this point you aren't sold on the idea of searching the hell out of the universe for other life to enrich our understanding of ourselves then you deserve to have your geek epaulettes stripped off on the parade ground in front of the whole platoon.

(Of course, having lived though the PC years and then the Internet years, I would tend to favour the "compatibility outweighs efficiency" model, but I wouldn't use that argument from analogy too seriously)
posted by Devonian at 6:15 AM on September 19, 2015 [4 favorites]

I'm now imagining a hideous, gigantic rooster ... meat birds ... the industry standard for all your nugget and wing needs ... grow so fast that their bone structure can't keep up. They are usually butchered at 6 weeks because if they are let live to maturity (12 weeks) many will go lame. They can't support their own weight and become floppy, splayed legged, floor based creatures who will suffer a suffocating, trampling death ... if they don't have a heart attack first. I used to raise them when I was a kid to make some money. My sister ran the adjoining chicken hospital. We put together a bunch of rabbit cages where we would put the lame birds so they would have their own house. I usually got 40 chicks every spring and nearly 10 would finish their days needing individual care.
posted by phoque at 6:19 AM on September 19, 2015 [3 favorites]

People are often giving wasps a hard time, especially on social media. Wasps can be useful e.g. if you have raspberries. They also make excellent pets, and here's a video example.

Shame on those who expouse waspite rhetoric, especially those who should know better, or who hypocritically claim they are tolerant people. Until they encounter a wasp.

"First they came for the wasps, and I did not speak out, because I was not a wasp..."
posted by Wordshore at 6:24 AM on September 19, 2015 [1 favorite]

From the 'wasps as pets' link: "Wasps are capable of learning. They can learn to distinguish between threats and non-threats. In a managed colony, wasps may associate human fingers with availability of food rather than a threat."

It's odd how just one word can put you off an idea.
posted by Devonian at 6:53 AM on September 19, 2015

That is sooooo cool. "Domestication" is a weird way to put it--I mean, common in the HGT field, but imo a problematic way to talk about it. But jumping genes, transposable elements that move around a genome, have long thought to be a way to remix genetic material in order to create qualitatively NEW genes. I'd really like to see a major lepidopteran gene tree done with some of these genes, to see at what point they were inserted into the genome and when they became "domesticated."

I love you, molecular organismal evolution!
posted by Made of Star Stuff at 7:55 AM on September 19, 2015

Since 90% of our own microbes are non-human.

Personally, I've only got one Cartesian homunculus and several trillion enrolled members of my microbiome. However, given that it doesn't work great, maybe that's my problem.
posted by ambrosen at 3:00 PM on September 20, 2015

Virus is a language from outer space.
posted by five fresh fish at 10:47 PM on September 20, 2015

An awerrible cock (a hen, actually). (SFW).
posted by notyou at 6:49 AM on September 21, 2015 [1 favorite]