Did a genetically modified-mosquito experiment go wrong?

September 23, 2019 11:29 AM

From 2013 to 2015, an English biotech company released millions of genetically modified mosquitoes into neighborhoods in Jacobina, Brazil, in an effort to reduce the number of native disease-carrying mosquitoes. Its strategy: Deploy (nonbiting) male Aedes aegypti mosquitoes bearing a gene that should doom most of their offspring before adulthood. The method has successfully reduced native mosquito populations by at least 85%. Unexpectedly (Live Science), some of the gene-edited mosquitoes passed on their genes to the native insects, fueling concerns that they created a more robust hybrid species (Scientific Reports). The study is now being criticized for making that claim (Science).
posted by not_the_water (27 comments total)

From the Science Magazine link:

Jason Rasgon, an entomologist at Pennsylvania State University in State College who studies insect-borne diseases, says the genetic finding is important. “But I think there are a number of things that are really overhyped and kind of irresponsible about the paper,” says Rasgon, who has no financial ties to Oxitec. The authors should have emphasized that they didn’t find any mosquitoes carrying Oxitec’s transgenes, he says, referring to the two genes, foreign to A. aegypti, introduced to kill offspring and to fluorescently label the mosquitoes as GM. The novel DNA that did show up in the Jacobina population was from the Oxitec mosquitoes’ genetic “background”—a cross between strains from Cuba and Mexico.

Rasgon, like Oxitec, takes issue with the paper’s assertion that the mixing of genomes “likely” made the population stronger by increasing its genetic variation. (“Failed GM mosquito control experiment may have strengthened wild bugs,” read one headline last week.) “We don’t know that that’s the case here, but we do know that this population is a hybrid of three strains,” Powell says. His team, however, didn’t test whether the hybrid mosquitoes were more resistant to pesticides or more likely to transmit disease. Neither was true of the Oxitec mosquitoes themselves, Rose says.

Sounds like unclear reporting from Oxitec and the Scientific Report article (open access, not paywalled), though the SR paper notes "It is unclear how this may affect disease transmission or affect other efforts to control these dangerous vectors," to hopefully tamp down the "OMG, bioengeered superbugs are loose!" coverage. Assuming reporters didn't quickly skim the paper looking for the juiciest bits to use as headlines and taglines.
posted by filthy light thief at 11:46 AM on September 23, 2019 [6 favorites]

Life finds a way.
posted by alex_skazat at 12:00 PM on September 23, 2019 [5 favorites]

Life finds a way when helped by an English biotech company.
posted by bondcliff at 12:34 PM on September 23, 2019 [7 favorites]

Why must every article that mentions mosquitoes show a giant photo of the damned things? I'm quite allergic to them, and hate seeing them. Yeah, modifying genes, it probably goes right most of the time, until you get enormous angry bunnies.
posted by theora55 at 12:41 PM on September 23, 2019 [3 favorites]

Left without any necessary comment, via Science: "Things don’t always work out the way you expect."
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 12:44 PM on September 23, 2019 [2 favorites]

Hell yes it went wrong, they missed 15% of the mosquitoes.
posted by BeeDo at 1:03 PM on September 23, 2019 [9 favorites]

I'm still leery of the whole "wiping out sections of the food chain" thing, even if for a good cause
posted by Ray Walston, Luck Dragon at 1:16 PM on September 23, 2019 [16 favorites]

So it sounds like the modified mosquitoes worked but people have latched on to "SCIENCE GONE WRONG" just like they were before the mosquitoes were released, which is probably a more exciting headline and taps into the conscious fear of human tampering.
posted by GoblinHoney at 1:29 PM on September 23, 2019 [5 favorites]

Results from recent lab and field tests show >90% (close to 100% in some trials) mortality in male mosquitoes exposed to attractive sugar baits -- 10% sugar, 1% boric acid a common formulation. Cheap and easy and very hard for resistance to arise. But. It would also kill any other nectar feeding insects -- ants, wasps, bees -- that feed on treated foliage or visit the bait stations. I have a sprayer and boric acid and a butt load of mosquitoes but still have refrained from spraying. It just seems like unintended consequences are just waiting to, err, bite. In malarial zones the tradeoffs are probably worth it, tho.
posted by PandaMomentum at 1:32 PM on September 23, 2019 [3 favorites]

people have latched on to "SCIENCE GONE WRONG"

The semi-blind fumbling with poorly understood new technology, desperation to push forwards, and head-in-the-sand approach to unknown risk, however, is reminding me more and more of the lead-up to the shuttle accidents.

Except, this time it's not just seven dead space folks and some scrap metal falling out of the sky.
posted by CynicalKnight at 2:03 PM on September 23, 2019 [4 favorites]

I'm guessing the attitude towards this kind of experiment would vary somewhat if the 700 million people getting sick and the 1 million dying each year were of a paler skin color.
posted by signal at 2:06 PM on September 23, 2019 [16 favorites]

If white people were dying we'd have a government-funded crash program and the whole thing would be done in five years.

Oh, and it would have been done in 1951.
posted by Kadin2048 at 2:35 PM on September 23, 2019 [5 favorites]

Yeah there’s going to be some surprising results, if we knew 100% of the consequence then this wouldn’t be science. But a long as Malaria, Dengue and Zika kill and maim millions I’m going to say... the risk is worth it?
posted by midmarch snowman at 2:39 PM on September 23, 2019 [4 favorites]

I'm guessing the attitude towards this kind of experiment would vary somewhat if the 700 million people getting sick and the 1 million dying each year were of a paler skin color.

We're exterminating species left and right — what's one more to the pile? But maybe it is also important to know that we in the science community may have all the best intentions, while really not fully understanding what we are doing, and the consequences of it, and yet we do it anyway. Surely there is something to learn here.
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 2:54 PM on September 23, 2019 [1 favorite]

Oh, and it would have been done in 1951.

Or the near future. From the Science link: Last week, the U.S. Environmental Protection opened a monthlong window for public comments on the company's proposed releases in Florida and Texas
posted by not_the_water at 3:03 PM on September 23, 2019 [1 favorite]

I'm still leery of the whole "wiping out sections of the food chain" thing, even if for a good cause

We can modify the birds that would have eaten the mosquitos to feed on humans instead, closing the gap.

That started as a joke, but now I’m not so sure.
posted by GenjiandProust at 3:04 PM on September 23, 2019 [8 favorites]

We can modify the birds that would have eaten the mosquitos to feed on humans instead, closing the gap.
You can no longer hide behind your pseudonym Jeff VanderMeer. Do I get a prize for unmasking you?
posted by thatwhichfalls at 3:36 PM on September 23, 2019 [5 favorites]

We can modify the birds that would have eaten the mosquitos to feed on humans instead, closing the gap.

Birds? What birds?
posted by dazed_one at 3:36 PM on September 23, 2019 [2 favorites]

What could possibly go wrong?
posted by Chuffy at 3:49 PM on September 23, 2019

It sounds like this paper has nothing whatsoever to do with genetic modification. It's simply the case that scientists introduced Mexican and Cuban strains of Aedes aegypti mosquitoes into the Brazilian population. The significance of these different strains of the same species is unclear.
posted by JackFlash at 3:58 PM on September 23, 2019

No, that's the beautiful part. When wintertime rolls around, the gorillas simply freeze to death. (Simpsons SLYT)
posted by mhum at 4:04 PM on September 23, 2019 [7 favorites]

They knew at the outset that "when the GM males mated with wild females, roughly 3% of their offspring survived" so the genetic mixing that occurred is exactly as expected. There is some question of how much...5-60% isn't very precise. But the "more robust" is pure speculation and, IMHO, pretty irresponsible.

If Oxitec had started with the local breed, it wouldn't even be an issue.
posted by CheeseDigestsAll at 4:57 PM on September 23, 2019 [2 favorites]

Whatever happened to good old irradiation induced sterility?
posted by Popular Ethics at 7:12 PM on September 23, 2019 [1 favorite]

If white people were dying we'd have a government-funded crash program and the whole thing would be done in five years.

White people dying by the hundreds didn't make a difference when like 80%* of the population of France went to go build the Panama Canal and then died of malaria.

*Ok it wasn't 80%, but if you read The Path Between the Seas by David Mccullough, after the page after page of "Then these guys went there, but they all died. Then these guys went, but they all died. Then else guys etc. etc." it sure seems like 80%
posted by sideshow at 7:36 PM on September 23, 2019 [2 favorites]

everyone was dying by the hundreds in the 1800s

don't think it's a good comparison
posted by Kutsuwamushi at 8:56 PM on September 23, 2019 [2 favorites]

I'm guessing the attitude towards this kind of experiment would vary somewhat if the 700 million people getting sick and the 1 million dying each year were of a paler skin color.

I mean, this line of argument can cut both ways - I'd be surprised if nobody has tried to frame this as an irresponsible experiment with the lives of the brown people who are going to have to deal with the super mosquitoes if things go wrong.

(I don't know how plausible that scenario really ever was, so I'm not sure how good an argument it is, but it's not as if there isn't some legitimately ghoulish history one could attempt to link to.)
posted by atoxyl at 9:59 PM on September 23, 2019 [1 favorite]

>90% (close to 100% in some trials) mortality in male mosquitoes exposed to attractive sugar baits -- 10% sugar, 1% boric acid a common formulation. Cheap and easy and very hard for resistance to arise. But. It would also kill any other nectar feeding insects

It would be pretty easy to mechanically screen out the larger nectar feeders though. Do we know if there are other mosquito-sized nectivores that would be affected?

Also, [sparkles] I n n o v a t i o n [/sparkles]
posted by sneebler at 2:24 PM on September 24, 2019