| Summary: | <p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p><it>Wolbachia</it> are maternally inherited endosymbiotic bacteria that manipulate the reproductive success of their insect hosts. Uninfected females that mate with <it>Wolbachia</it> infected males do not reproduce due to cytoplasmic incompatibility (CI). CI results in the increased frequency of <it>Wolbachia</it>-infected individuals in populations. Recently, two <it>Wolbachia</it> strains, the benign <it>w</it>Mel and virulent <it>w</it>MelPop have been artificially transinfected into the primary vector of dengue virus, the mosquito <it>Ae. aegypti</it> where they have formed stable infections. These <it>Wolbachia</it> infections are being developed for a biological control strategy against dengue virus transmission. While the effects of <it>Wolbachia</it> on female <it>Ae. aegypti</it> have been examined the effects on males are less well characterised. Here we ascertain and compare the effects of the two strains on male fitness in resource-limited environments that may better approximate the natural environment.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>A series of population mating trials were conducted to examine the effect of <it>Wolbachia</it> infection status (with strains <it>w</it>Mel and <it>w</it>MelPop) and male larval nutrition on insemination frequency, remating rates, the fecundity of females, the hatch rates of eggs and the wing length and fertility of males.</p> <p>Results</p> <p><it>w</it>Mel and <it>w</it>MelPop infections reduce the fecundity of infected females and <it>w</it>MelPop reduces the viability of eggs. Low nutrition diets for males in the larval phase affects the fecundity of <it>w</it>Mel-infected females. Neither strain of <it>Wolbachia</it> affected sperm quality or viability or the ability of males to successfully mate multiple females.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>The benign strain of <it>Wolbachia</it>, <it>w</it>Mel causes similar reductions in fecundity as the more virulent, <it>w</it>MelPop, and neither are too great that they should not still spread given the action of CI. The ability of <it>Wolbachia</it>-infected males to repeat mate as frequently as wildtype mosquitoes indicates that they will be very good agents of delivering CI in field release populations.</p>
|
|---|