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First genetically modified mosquitoes released in the United States

329 points by infodocket 5y ago

nikolay 5y ago
With globalization, how can one believe this could stay contained just in the Keys? These mosquitoes came from Africa, the Asian tiger mosquito came to Europe and America. We can't really predict the spread.
tedd4u 5y ago
What could go wrong? (serious question!)
- molszanski 5y ago
  As far as I understand they are using a gene drive which is risky. Gerne drive is an artificial technique to force gene propagation. The risk lies in mutation + gene drive.
- cptskippy 5y ago
  We could find out what role mosquitoes play in the environment when it collapses suddenly.
  - WalterGR 5y ago
    I believe that we’ve already found that out via irradiated mosquitos, but I don’t have a link to a paper handy.
  - bedobi 5y ago
    Mosquitoes do play a role in the environment. This particular one doesn't really though. No need to take the word of some stranger on the internet, there's plenty of very knowledgeable, very environmentally minded people who agree and have explained why.
- fractal618 5y ago
  Maybe a global pandemic of something stupid like that. Who knows
- gridspy 5y ago
  The modified genes (or a later mutation) provide some advantage to their offspring, combined with a failed self-destruct. That causes the population of Mosquitoes to become more troublesome. Hopefully unlikely!!
- echelon 5y ago
  If mosquitos are a keystone species in the food web, population decline could have drastic effects. We don't currently believe that they are, however.
  - op00to 5y ago
    Doesn’t matter. This mosquito is not native to the area that they’re testing in, and even if it was native only makes up 2% of total mosquito population in the test area. This is all upside.
- multiplegeorges 5y ago
  The eradication of a seemingly unimportant species of mosquito that has an unknown but very important link to some other much more important species. If that were to happen (seems very unlikely, but not zero chance), they could see some ecosystem disruption they didn't anticipate. The worst, worst possible case would be this gene getting somehow into the general mosquito population and making mosquitoes extinct. That would be a disaster since they are an important food source for so many other species. Presumably, the much-smarter-than-me scientists have thought of this.
  - red75prime 5y ago
    > That would be a disaster since they are an important food source for so many other species. Or it wouldn't be a disaster since there's no species that exclusively feed on mosquitos.
  - titzer 5y ago
    So, Linus Upson, former VP of Chrome, left Chrome to work on this. He explained it to me thusly: The species of mosquito targeted here is actually a pest that follows humans around. It tends to only infest areas where humans have settled and mostly preys on humans. Where we go, it goes. The genetic modification here is designed to shut down their breeding patterns. It targets that specific species and is far, far better for the local ecosystems than pesticides or other measures. Basically, it's trying to kill off a pest species we bring with us.
    - RcouF1uZ4gsC 5y ago
      It seems the FUD regarding this is very similar to anti-vax FUD. Yes, if you are not careful vaccines can cause massive problems. In addition, theoretical downsides that have been considered and deemed unlikely by the scientific community (like making it seem that disease carrying mosquitos are an irreplaceable food source) are trotted out again and again. In addition, just like with vaccines, the risk of doing nothing (kids die from measles, etc in the case of vaccines, and kids die from malaria and Zika, etc in the case of mosquito control).
- gridspy 5y ago
  Female self-destruct gene somehow ends up in a different species. Via virus (which can transfer DNA segments) perhaps. Hopefully far-fetched.
  - avodonosov 5y ago
    Or simply interspecies reproduction.
    - avodonosov 5y ago
      A funny part in the wikipedia article: > Among insects, so-called killer bees were accidentally created during an attempt to breed a strain of bees that would both produce more honey and be better adapted to tropical conditions. It was done by crossing a European honey bee and an African bee. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hybrid_(biology) https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hybrid_(biology)
  - smiley1437 5y ago
    Yeah it would suck if a freak viral accident transferred this to humans, we then get to live through Frank Herbert’s ‘The White Plague’ (where men are carriers for a disease that kills only women) Inheritable fertility manipulation and gene drives should be applied very, very carefully
- fractal618 5y ago
  Might cascade into the collapse of a few ecosystems. Who knows? Not my problem. All joking aside, I hope everything works out okay.
  - BuyMyBitcoins 5y ago
    I’m sure there is a lab somewhere with pristine, non-GMO affected mosquito population and they can reintroduce them if need be.
    - tspike 5y ago
      Isn't the point that this mosquito wipes out pristine, non-GMO affected mosquito populations?
- wittyreference 5y ago
  They comprise a large percentage of the caloric intake of a lot of bird species, which are already fragile due to ecosystem fracturing. This could result in a hit to bird populations - and if the mosquitos adapt and rebound, the birds are unlikely to rebound nearly as quickly, allowing for a potential enormous boom in total mosquito population.
  - wittyreference 5y ago
    I don’t really know why this prompted straight up downvotes. These are the exact concerns voiced in multiple Nature articles over the past decade or so.
- NOGDP 5y ago
  I wonder of the same mechanism that allow mosquitoes to transfer disease also works as a vaccination for animals?
- lemmonii 5y ago
  1. Females evolve to detect males with the bad genes. Population will dip but recover. By opening this evolutionary pathway we could enhance the mosquitoes in unintended ways. 2. Some males will evolve genes which disable the sterilization gene. By opening this evolutionary pathway we could enhance the mosquitoes in unintended ways.
  - asdff 5y ago
    Populations are always mutating at the same rate and selection is always occurring no matter what you do.
deleted 5y ago
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DominoTree 5y ago
They’ve been releasing mosquitoes sterilized via various means for decades to do population control - this isn’t as extreme as people make it out to be
RcouF1uZ4gsC 5y ago
What many people fail to consider is the alternatives to this. There is no scenario where the US and Florida government are just going to say that mosquito born illness is just a fact of life and we just have to life with it. Mosquito control efforts will happen. Right now that involves spraying a bunch of pesticides everywhere. If the mosquitos develop resistance, likely new pesticides with potential more environmental effects will be used. In fact, one of the reasons DDT was used so widely throughout the US was for mosquito control. What these genetically engineered mosquitos offer is a chance for a more surgical, more environmentally friendly mosquito control option. Instead of massive spraying that kills not only disease causing mosquitoes but likely harms a lot of other bystander species as well, if we can specifically target the biting, disease carrying mosquitos effectively, both humans and the environment will be better off.
- TaylorAlexander 5y ago
  I mean that’s the story if all goes well. But these things tend to have unintended consequences. Your comments about eradicating this so-called pest sound similar to the arguments for mass fumigation of DDT. “This harmless solution will eliminate pests that plague humans.” But then it turned out collapsing ecosystems was bad and it also nearly drove the Peregrine Falcon to extinction because it would accumulate in their bodies and damaged their eggs. So sure. Assuming we know all the possible downsides the happy story makes sense. But we keep finding out that we don’t know all the downsides in advance. In nature, everything is connected. We have a long history of thinking simple technological solutions will solve our problems, and especially in nature that kind of thinking has led to environmental disaster time and time again.
  - RcouF1uZ4gsC 5y ago
    > But then it turned out collapsing ecosystems was bad and it also nearly drove the Peregrine Falcon to extinction because it would accumulate in their bodies and damaged their eggs. I would argue, that the benefit of cutting down endemic malaria and yellow fever in the United States and the lives said and the people who did not get sick was worth the risk to the Peregrine Falcon. In nature, everything is connected. But to believe that it is too connected for humans to be able to successfully manipulate the environment for our benefit is anti-science. Growing more food, curing disease, increasing human longevity does have follow-on effects for nature, but I would argue that manipulation of Nature for human’s benefit is something we as humans can and should do. Yes, we should be aware of unintended side effects, but we cannot let ourselves be paralyzed by fear.
fogof 5y ago
It seems like, barring some effect of the fluorescent marker gene on reproductive fitness, the proportion of instances of this gene in the male mosquito population doesn't naturally decrease over time. Given this, perhaps its possible this measure will eventually eradicate the Aedes aegypti in the Keys, through genetic drift.
move-on-by 5y ago
I remember reading about this when Zika was new and my wife was pregnant. I’m excited about it and hope the science of it proves out with proper due diligence. Social distancing and use of masks certainly won’t aid with mosquito spread diseases. Furthermore, widespread use of pesticides is devastating to desirable insects, particularly bees. Having a tool to control the mosquito population that doesn’t directly impact other insects would certainly be a win in my book.
mtillman 5y ago
This is great news! Finally, the US is using a solution common to the rest of the developed world. Did someone on this thread honestly say inter-species procreation? Has HN become Nextdoor?
- bawolff 5y ago
  Well i dont think its a reasonable worry here, where precisely do you think mules come from?
- strictnein 5y ago
  > inter-species procreation I mean, that's a thing. Ligers, mules, etc. And where, exactly, is this "common" in the rest of the "developed" world? Best I could Google is that France and other EU countries approved its use just ~3.5 years ago: https://www.labiotech.eu/more-news/genetically-modified-mosquitoes-oxitec-netherlands/ https://www.labiotech.eu/more-news/genetically-modified-mosq...
DubiousPusher 5y ago
> “When something new and revolutionary comes along, the immediate reaction of a lot of people is to say: ‘Wait.’,” I don't think novelty is the problem here. Humans have a genuinely terrible track record of ecosystem engineering. Unintended consequences are pretty common.
- mc32 5y ago
  Hmmmm African killer bees... On the other hand, these are males whose female offspring are designed to die. If they were regular male mosquitoes their female offspring would have the same survival rate as males. So the bad scenario is the female offspring survive as normal. The super bad scenario is they only beget female mosquitoes I guess. Yes that would be worse.
  - silasdavis 5y ago
    We can make a better disaster film script than that. How about some rare second generation females survive then turn out to be far more potent disease carriers and rebuild a population of super mosquitoes in their place. Mosquitoes are buggers though.
    - pvaldes 5y ago
      I liked the part where the infertility genes somehow manage to contaminate the human DNA and both humans and condom market collapse at the same time, yep...
      - breischl 5y ago
        >both humans and condom market collapse at the same time lol, I like your framing of that. I can just picture the headlines: HUMANITY TO BE ERADICATED!!!!! Also, condom sales fall
    - wildmanx 5y ago
      Or what about this experiment actually working, this specific species going extinct (or at least driven out), and that 4% nice that's now empty gets taken over by another type of mosquitoes or other type of insect that has the bad properties you describe? Not too unlikely as we tend to have no clue what will happen when we eco-engineer something away. And if we think we have a clue, it tends to be wrong. Or what about this: they go extinct/away and it turns out there was some predator that now doesn't get food anymore and is decimated while their competition gets now out of hand? Next pest please.
gadf 5y ago
Then the Lord said to Moses, “Get up early in the morning and confront Pharaoh as he goes to the river and say to him, ‘This is what the Lord says: Let my people go, so that they may worship me. If you do not let my people go, I will send swarms of flies on you and your officials, on your people and into your houses. The houses of the Egyptians will be full of flies; even the ground will be covered with them.
gorgoiler 5y ago
Who underwrites this kind of experiment? I can’t imagine that the FKMCD or Oxitec have liability insurance that covers the externalities of modifying wildlife. They also don’t have the manpower but I see this comes under the umbrella of the EPA and therefore the Federal Government. That gives some assurance that if a Really Bad Thing happens, there will be global-scale resources to implement a cleanup.
- thatguy0900 5y ago
  It's certainly comforting to know that when a company does a ecological really bad thing it's actually cleaned up and not just ignored and swept under the rug by both governments and the corporation.
bedobi 5y ago
Countless species are already going extinct all the time, both known to us and completely unknown to us, and both "naturally" and from human impact, and no one really cares. Here's a rare case of a species that there is very good reason to deliberately get rid of, and suddenly people care and object, a lot!? Of course there's justifiable skepticism and a long, sorry history of unintended consequences of introducing, eradicating or in any way modifying a species or its behavior, but seriously, read up on it, this is not one of those species, pretty much everyone who knows anything about it (including otherwise very environmentally minded people who as a rule would never, ever agree with deliberately eradicating anything) agrees it can be eradicated with no meaningful impact on the ecosystem. (and yes, that includes even the armchair criticism from cynical misanthropes who consider human deaths resulting from this species a good thing "because humans are bad for the environment" - while these mosquitoes do cause a lot of human deaths, the environmental "benefit" of those deaths are completely meaningless in the grand scheme of things)
- artificialLimbs 5y ago
  70 years ago (roughly, may be inexact), everyone who also "knows anything about it" said it was a fantastic idea to spray our kids with DDT. I wish I could pin down the reasoning to explain why I feel this is wrong, but intuition is the only thing I have to go on, even as heavily discounted that is in this day and age. Mosquitos are horrible little devils, and we swat every one we can and destroy their habitats when we find them. Glad to see you at least have a seed of skepticism in you. Humans are notoriously bad at playing god.
  - tick_tock_tick 5y ago
    I feel like you are are ignoring the fact DDT is still commonly used around the world as it does more good then harm.
    - deleted 5y ago
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    - jacobolus 5y ago
07121941 5y ago
I might be duct taping two buzzwords but could GMO mosquitoes carry mrna packages???
- jcims 5y ago
  Probably not directly as it would have to be something that can survive or be expressed through the mouth parts of the mosquito. Malaria spreads from human to human through a mosquito because the parasite (known as plasmodium) that causes it is ingested from one human then reproduces outside the reach of the mosquitos immune system. If a benign organism evolves or could be developed to do the same, that organism could be genetically modified to create and/or express the intended antigens as exosomes. When it spreads to humans, these particles would be emitted and presumably detected by the human's immune system. From: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plasmodium https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plasmodium >In the mosquito, the gametocytes move along with the blood meal to the mosquito's midgut. Here the gametocytes develop into male and female gametes which fertilize each other, forming a zygote. Zygotes then develop into a motile form called an ookinete, which penetrates the wall of the midgut. Upon traversing the midgut wall, the ookinete embeds into the gut's exterior membrane and develops into an oocyst. Oocysts divide many times to produce large numbers of small elongated sporozoites. These sporozoites migrate to the salivary glands of the mosquito where they can be injected into the blood of the next host the mosquito bites, repeating the cycle. From: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5253278/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5253278/ >In the context of immune responses against pathogens, exosomes also carries pathogen antigens and known to evoke immune responses. Mycobacterium bovis BCG-infected macrophages release EVs containing mycobacterial antigen that, in the presence of DCs, promote T-cell immunity in mice (10). Regarding the topic at hand, I'm curious if mosquitoes play a role in innoculating their hosts with very small pathogen loads that are quickly killed off by the immunological response to the bite, but also foster antibody creation and help to spread immunity.
AbrahamParangi 5y ago
I am not against this, but I will play devil's advocate on behalf of the mosquitos. In 1958 the Four Pests Campaign called for the elimination of four pests, one of which was the sparrow. Sparrows were accused of consuming grain and as a result were targeted for elimination. A popular sparrow hunting campaign led to the near extinction of the Eurasian tree sparrow in China. Shortly afterwards locust populations boomed, now missing one of their principle predators. The "smash sparrows campaign" is credited with worsening the Great Chinese Famine, which saw somewhere between 15 and 55 million people die. The people who smashed sparrows believed it was correct just as surely as we believe anything today.
- robotcookies 5y ago
  We should save some of the mosquitoes in labs in case there are unintended consequences. Then if needed, they can be bred and brought back to the environment.
  - throwanem 5y ago
    The world has no shortage of Aedes aegypti. The intent here isn't to annihilate the species worldwide, but to eradicate it from a specific region in which it is harmfully invasive.
- SoylentYellow 5y ago
  On the other hand, consider that the screwworm barrier has been a huge success: https://www.nationalgeographic.com/animals/article/north-american-screwworm-barrier https://www.nationalgeographic.com/animals/article/north-ame...
- ppseafield 5y ago
  This one species is not native to the Keys and is responsible for nearly all the mosquito-bourne illness there. If this kills every single mosquito of this species, 96% of the total mosquito population will remain. > ...suppressing populations of wild Aedes aegypti mosquitoes, which can carry diseases such as Zika, dengue, chikungunya and yellow fever. > Aedes aegypti makes up about 4% of the mosquito population in the Keys, a chain of tropical islands off the southern tip of Florida. But it is responsible for practically all mosquito-borne disease transmitted to humans in the region
yawnxyz 5y ago
I was in the Keys in a townhall meeting when everything went down between the residents and Oxitec. I just remember the Oxitec management and scientists, with their British accents and their old school suits, really stood out like cartoon villains. What everyone wanted was more studies and data to assure the ecosystem wouldn't get screwed up, and basically it came down to a chicken and the egg problem. Oxitec knew they needed more data, but they couldn't produce the data until it was released in the Keys. I don't anyone at the meeting was anti-science, they were just not convinced Oxitec had the well-being of the residents in mind.
- TheJoeMan 5y ago
  We must have attended different meetings. I watched people think they were going to turn into mosquito peter parker. I do agree on the conundrum about needing more data, and I think the Keys is a fantastic place to try.
hassancf 5y ago
What could go wrong? Actually what went wrong in 2020 already: <<They found that some of the genes from the genetically modified mosquitoes had transferred to the native population. In other words, some of the offspring had survived and were strong enough to reproduce. This new population is a hybrid of Brazilian mosquitoes and the genetically modified mosquitoes that were created from strains in Cuba and Mexico, according to the study, which was published Sept. 10 in the journal Scientific Reports. "The claim was that genes from the release strain would not get into the general population because offspring would die," senior author Jeffrey Powell, a professor of ecology and evolutionary biology at Yale University, said in a statement. "That obviously was not what happened." >> Source: https://www.livescience.com/genetically-modified-mosquitoes-create-hybrids.html https://www.livescience.com/genetically-modified-mosquitoes-... So we are not really sure that this company knows what they are doing. See also : https://twitter.com/vtchakarova/status/1297275503267713028?s=21 https://twitter.com/vtchakarova/status/1297275503267713028?s...
- cycrutchfield 5y ago
  > This method has successfully reduced native mosquito populations in Brazil by up to 85%, the researchers wrote. What’s the issue?
  - hassancf 5y ago
    This is the issue: <<But it is the unanticipated outcome that is concerning," Powell added. In fact, the genes that were passed on weren't the tweaked genes that were designed to kill and tag the mosquitoes but rather genes from the strains in Cuba and Mexico, according to Science magazine. The researchers also noted that this mixing of genes might have led to a "more robust population," perhaps one that would be better able to resist insecticides or transmit diseases, Science magazine reported. >> https://www.livescience.com/genetically-modified-mosquitoes-create-hybrids.html https://www.livescience.com/genetically-modified-mosquitoes-... In other words, something they didn’t expect happened. What else will happen that they did not expect?
  - pvaldes 5y ago
    I would seriously doubt any claiming coming from Brazil in this context of anti-science aligned government and fake news scenery.
dang 5y ago
Recent and related: First GMO Mosquitoes to Be Released in the Florida Keys - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26834413 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26834413 - April 2021 (126 comments) 750M genetically engineered mosquitoes approved for release in Florida Keys - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24218044 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24218044 - Aug 2020 (13 comments)
walterbell 5y ago
Oxitec's GMO mosquitos were previously released in Brazil (450,000 during 2013-2015) and lead to unplanned genetic contamination of the local mosquito population, https://gizmodo.com/genetically-modified-mosquitoes-are-breeding-in-brazil-1838146152 https://gizmodo.com/genetically-modified-mosquitoes-are-bree... > tests conducted by Oxitec prior to the experiment suggested that around 3 to 4 percent of F1 offspring would survive into adulthood, but it was presumed these lingering mosquitoes would be too weak to reproduce, rendering them infertile. These predictions, as the new research shows, were wrong … portions of the genome from the transgenic strain had “incorporated into the target population,” ... anywhere from 10 to 60 percent of mosquitoes analyzed featured genomes tainted by OX513A … the Oxitec scheme worked at first, resulting in a dramatic reduction in the size of the mosquito population. But at the 18-month mark, the population began to recover, returning to nearly pre-release levels. According to the paper, this was on account of a phenomenon known as “mating discrimination,” in which females of the native species began to avoid mating with modified males.
- kungito 5y ago
  this is like, the first thought you have when thinking about this problem. why would the females choose the infected one
  - 0-_-0 5y ago
    Because they can't tell the difference. It's not obvious that they can evolve to tell the difference until you try.
    - trhway 5y ago
      >Because they can't tell the difference. you're kidding. I mean to people of course all mosquito look the same. It is a top of anthropocentrism though to think that mosquito would not differentiate. The basis of selection is "best fit" (to bring in and/or bring up new generation), and the weakness to the point of infertility is naturally selected out very quickly.
chmod600 5y ago
It seems like such a thing could come about as a natural mutation. How would evolution normally get rid of such destructive genes?
- p1mrx 5y ago
  If a species produces an excessive number of males, then it becomes advantageous to produce more females to mate with them, so evolution is always nudging them back to a 50:50 ratio: https://www.blackwellpublishing.com/ridley/tutorials/Adaptations_in_sexual_reproduction26.asp https://www.blackwellpublishing.com/ridley/tutorials/Adaptat... So I guess the idea behind genetic engineering is to destabilize the ratio and wipe out the species faster than natural evolution can respond. I would suggest reading "The Selfish Gene", which covers a lot of topics like this.
- silasdavis 5y ago
  It would remove those less fit. I think the point of the effect only being at second generation is that it makes the lack of fitness signal weaker in these males than ordinarily sterilised males. Added to that they keep releasing the modified mosquitoes so they are more numerous (in effect more fit since they have a massive breeding advantage from the humans breeding them).
claaams 5y ago
I hope I live long enough to see how disastrously this backfires.
dukeofdoom 5y ago
Fun fact, mosquitos pollinate blueberries in Alaska.
- BoorishBears 5y ago
  This comment sure got shorter... But yeah, I honestly don't care what mosquitos do that's useful, we should eradicate them. The sheer scale of human suffering they've brought via disease transmission is just too great. Malaria makes COVID look like cooties. We've "accidentally" eradicated much more beneficial species than mosquitos, this is the very last place to start taking a stand.
- bedobi 5y ago
  Fun fact, these mosquitoes are not pollinators, they're an invasive species, constitute only a tiny fraction of the mosquito population where they exist, and don't fill any meaningful ecological role.
TedShiller 5y ago
What could possibly go wrong?
alpb 5y ago
Are we sure these are the first? Verily labs (subsidiary of Alphabet) already released these mosquitoes back in 2017 in Bay Area https://www.theverge.com/2017/7/14/15972950/mosquitoes-google-alphabet-verily-debug-wolbachia-bacteria-fresno-california https://www.theverge.com/2017/7/14/15972950/mosquitoes-googl....
_Microft 5y ago
Mosquitoes do not cause Malaria, they transmit the parasite that does. Eradicating mosquitoes is like wanting to shoot the messenger. It especially sad to read this a week or two after the announcement that a Malaria vaccine with good efficacy is undergoing trials with good success. But I guess the successes at creating a better vaccine only mean that these people will try to accelerate their scheme before there is no reason anymore to actually have to unleash their new toy on the world.
rofws 5y ago
Do mosquitos aid the ecosystem in any other way, apart from being food for insects?
- bedobi 5y ago
  No. This species is invasive everywhere outside Africa, constitutes only a tiny fraction of the mosquito population where they exist, and doesn't fill any meaningful ecological role anywhere.
- bourgoin 5y ago
  We don't really know. Complex ecological systems are relatively poorly understood.
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dagorenouf 5y ago
Now that sounds like a good idea. /s
webreac 5y ago
There are studies. Killing some species of mosquitoes may be entirely beneficial. But if this happens to succeed, what will be next ? Will we use this technology to eradicate another specie and discover too late that this one was very important ? We are creating a precedent. I favor eradicating some species of mosquitoes, but this should stop there. My worry is that human is rarely able to stop after a success. What will be the failure that will cause us to stop ? How devastating will be this failure ?
viktorcode 5y ago
Many people have raised concerns about introducing modified genes into mosquito population, but nobody seems to care about insecticides usage on mass scale, which leads to proliferation of resistant mosquitos by means of evolution. I think the bias is that in the first example mosquito genes are considered unnatural, yet in the second nobody cares about genome. "Not directly manipulated means natural"
- highmastdon 5y ago
  Exactly! I think a lot of problems that we have currently are being tackled by fighting symptoms instead of looking at the source. We can't make the world around us work in our ways. We'd be much better off working with the worlds way and improving upon that. With this mosquito problem, I can think of multiple things that need to change: insecticides, herbicides that influence the places where birds nest, birds and other small animals are affected by both insecticides and herbicides because their habitat is being destroyed. Herbicides influence the ground on which we grow crops, the ground gets infertile, fungi and small ground animals aren't working the ground to keep it strong and a welcoming habitat for the whole food chain. As long as we keep killing the smallest in the food chain, we kill eventually the bigger ones, and leave ourselves with problems like this.
  - bedobi 5y ago
    This species is invasive everywhere outside Africa, constitutes only a tiny fraction of the mosquito population where they exist, and doesn't fill any meaningful ecological role anywhere.
Cadwhisker 5y ago
I reject the idea that humans should make mosquitos extinct; they are a key part of the food chain. If that's not a good enough reason, I have a dumb hypothesis that mosquitos have played a part in evolution for millions of years, based on the premise that they spread viruses/retroviruses and retroviruses are capable of modifying DNA. They also spread other diseases which may cause certain genetic lines to survive over others. This hypothesis could be complete junk, but who is going to be able to run a scientific experiment that would take 10,000 years or more? The food chain reason is immediately obvious, but is anyone considering the impact over massive timescales?
- bedobi 5y ago
  Then you will be glad to hear that no one is proposing eradicating mosquitoes! What's being proposed it eradicating a single invasive mosquito species that doesn't belong in the ecosystem in question, constitutes only a tiny fraction of the mosquito population where they exist, and doesn't fill any meaningful ecological role anywhere! Instead of indiscriminately drenching entire ecosystems in DDT and other substances with god knows what effects. As for mosquitoes playing a part in evolution... Just what? I also note that you probably don't live in the affected areas. Sorry, but your feeling good about your ideological tastes being satisfied isn't worth more than literally millions of lives every year.
  - globular-toast 5y ago
    > As for mosquitoes playing a part in evolution... Just what? It sounds like a very plausible theory to me. Horizontal gene transfer is now well-known in bacteria. We know the tree of life is a vast oversimplification of the real processes that drive evolution. Why would you so quickly dismiss this idea?
    - bedobi 5y ago
      Even ignoring this species is invasive everywhere outside Africa, constitutes only a tiny fraction of the mosquito population where they exist, and doesn't fill any meaningful ecological role anywhere... The rest of the planet that has never had this mosquito are basically in danger then, from inability to "evolve", and humans shouldn't live in those areas lest they lose out on evolution? Will you move to an affected area to make sure you don't miss out?
coward76 5y ago
Burmese python and Kudzu, what could go wrong. We don't exactly have a good track record on this kind of thing.
myfavoritedog 5y ago
Oxitec mosquitoes carry a fluorescent marker gene that makes them glow when exposed to a specific colour of light, which makes identification easier. Should be interesting to see how long before the females develop the ability to detect and shun fluorescence. Then we can market fluorescent clothing as not only being pedestrian safe gear, but also mosquito repellent.
- yosito 5y ago
  As it turns out, fluorescent clothing is already a good choice to repel mosquitoes. Dark colors are notoriously bad to wear if you're going into mosquito territory.
matthewfelgate 5y ago
I've seen that movie. I bet it's got The Rock in it.
dbingham 5y ago
Honestly, I'm kind of surprised that any software engineer could be okay with us releasing anything genetically engineered into the wild. We can't manage systems that we designed to be highly decoupled and very manageable with out introducing bugs or triggering unintended consequences (sometime pretty catastrophic to the system in question). These are systems we ought to know everything about, because we built them, and that we've intentionally designed in such a way that a fault in one part of it shouldn't affect other parts of it. And yet, we often find they do in ways we never would have predicted. I'm talking here, of course, about software. Genetic code is a system we don't fully understand, that's vastly more complex than any of the software systems we've built, and that is highly coupled in ways we're only just beginning to understand. Tweak a gene that we're pretty sure does one thing, and it can have effects in completely unrelated systems we never would have predicted. And yet, we're going to mess around in that system and then release it out into wild ecosystems (another highly complex and highly coupled system that we don't fully understand). Ecosystems that we don't completely control. We have no rollback ability for these releases. No way to undo it. And we have no way to thoroughly test these changes impacts on the systems. Even in a culture with the mentality "move fast and break things" we don't act this cavalierly towards the systems we're working in. It's absolutely insane to behave this way. And it's only a matter of time before it bites us in the ass in a truly catastrophic way.
- itsangaris 5y ago
  The mRNA vaccines are genetically engineered, as is a lot of our agriculture. I see your point but that’s why this test was so heavily regulated by the FDA and had to conduct many trails before it was allowed to proceed.
  - dbingham 5y ago
    Yeah, I'm not arguing for abandoning genetic engineering entirely. The potential for it change the world in beneficial ways is huge. The mRNA vaccines are a great example where the risk is worth the reward and the possibilities of unintended consequences is relatively low. But our agriculture is a great example of an area where we should exercising way more caution than we are. There are unintended consequences we're already seeing, and further consequences that are impossible to predict.
loudtieblahblah 5y ago
do ticks next.
ViViDboarder 5y ago
How is this the first? Didn’t a Google do this in 2017? https://offgridsurvival.com/google-releases-20-million-genetically-engineered-mosquitos/ https://offgridsurvival.com/google-releases-20-million-genet...
SavantIdiot 5y ago
It is important to try it. As stated in the article, this only targets one invasive species that is 4% of the mosquito population in that region. That's a fairly focused application that probably hasn't had time or the volume to disrupt the ecosystem from its original introduction. Seems like a perfect test case.
elpakal 5y ago
Currently reading "The Mosquito: A Human History of Our Deadliest Predator" By Timothy Winegard, and in it he suggests that the mosquito was introduced by Columbus and is not native to the Americas. If this is true (I dunno if it is), I wonder if it changes the opinion of anyone arguing against this because of the "tampering with nature" angle.
EricE 5y ago
Search for Judas Goats and the Galapagos Islands. Would be hard to do the same to mosquitoes due to the size and quantity but same concept :p
OnlyMortal 5y ago
“What could possibly go wrong?”

329 points by infodocket 5y ago

With globalization, how can one believe this could stay contained just in the Keys? These mosquitoes came from Africa, the Asian tiger mosquito came to Europe and America. We can't really predict the spread.

tedd4u 5y ago

What could go wrong? (serious question!)

molszanski 5y ago
As far as I understand they are using a gene drive which is risky. Gerne drive is an artificial technique to force gene propagation. The risk lies in mutation + gene drive.
cptskippy 5y ago
We could find out what role mosquitoes play in the environment when it collapses suddenly.
- WalterGR 5y ago
  I believe that we’ve already found that out via irradiated mosquitos, but I don’t have a link to a paper handy.
- bedobi 5y ago
  Mosquitoes do play a role in the environment. This particular one doesn't really though. No need to take the word of some stranger on the internet, there's plenty of very knowledgeable, very environmentally minded people who agree and have explained why.
fractal618 5y ago
Maybe a global pandemic of something stupid like that. Who knows
gridspy 5y ago
The modified genes (or a later mutation) provide some advantage to their offspring, combined with a failed self-destruct. That causes the population of Mosquitoes to become more troublesome. Hopefully unlikely!!
echelon 5y ago
If mosquitos are a keystone species in the food web, population decline could have drastic effects. We don't currently believe that they are, however.
- op00to 5y ago
  Doesn’t matter. This mosquito is not native to the area that they’re testing in, and even if it was native only makes up 2% of total mosquito population in the test area. This is all upside.
multiplegeorges 5y ago
The eradication of a seemingly unimportant species of mosquito that has an unknown but very important link to some other much more important species. If that were to happen (seems very unlikely, but not zero chance), they could see some ecosystem disruption they didn't anticipate. The worst, worst possible case would be this gene getting somehow into the general mosquito population and making mosquitoes extinct. That would be a disaster since they are an important food source for so many other species. Presumably, the much-smarter-than-me scientists have thought of this.
- red75prime 5y ago
  > That would be a disaster since they are an important food source for so many other species. Or it wouldn't be a disaster since there's no species that exclusively feed on mosquitos.
- titzer 5y ago
  So, Linus Upson, former VP of Chrome, left Chrome to work on this. He explained it to me thusly: The species of mosquito targeted here is actually a pest that follows humans around. It tends to only infest areas where humans have settled and mostly preys on humans. Where we go, it goes. The genetic modification here is designed to shut down their breeding patterns. It targets that specific species and is far, far better for the local ecosystems than pesticides or other measures. Basically, it's trying to kill off a pest species we bring with us.
  - RcouF1uZ4gsC 5y ago
    It seems the FUD regarding this is very similar to anti-vax FUD. Yes, if you are not careful vaccines can cause massive problems. In addition, theoretical downsides that have been considered and deemed unlikely by the scientific community (like making it seem that disease carrying mosquitos are an irreplaceable food source) are trotted out again and again. In addition, just like with vaccines, the risk of doing nothing (kids die from measles, etc in the case of vaccines, and kids die from malaria and Zika, etc in the case of mosquito control).
gridspy 5y ago
Female self-destruct gene somehow ends up in a different species. Via virus (which can transfer DNA segments) perhaps. Hopefully far-fetched.
- avodonosov 5y ago
  Or simply interspecies reproduction.
  - avodonosov 5y ago
    A funny part in the wikipedia article: > Among insects, so-called killer bees were accidentally created during an attempt to breed a strain of bees that would both produce more honey and be better adapted to tropical conditions. It was done by crossing a European honey bee and an African bee. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hybrid_(biology) https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hybrid_(biology)
- smiley1437 5y ago
  Yeah it would suck if a freak viral accident transferred this to humans, we then get to live through Frank Herbert’s ‘The White Plague’ (where men are carriers for a disease that kills only women) Inheritable fertility manipulation and gene drives should be applied very, very carefully
fractal618 5y ago
Might cascade into the collapse of a few ecosystems. Who knows? Not my problem. All joking aside, I hope everything works out okay.
- BuyMyBitcoins 5y ago
  I’m sure there is a lab somewhere with pristine, non-GMO affected mosquito population and they can reintroduce them if need be.
  - tspike 5y ago
    Isn't the point that this mosquito wipes out pristine, non-GMO affected mosquito populations?
wittyreference 5y ago
They comprise a large percentage of the caloric intake of a lot of bird species, which are already fragile due to ecosystem fracturing. This could result in a hit to bird populations - and if the mosquitos adapt and rebound, the birds are unlikely to rebound nearly as quickly, allowing for a potential enormous boom in total mosquito population.
- wittyreference 5y ago
  I don’t really know why this prompted straight up downvotes. These are the exact concerns voiced in multiple Nature articles over the past decade or so.
NOGDP 5y ago
I wonder of the same mechanism that allow mosquitoes to transfer disease also works as a vaccination for animals?
lemmonii 5y ago
1. Females evolve to detect males with the bad genes. Population will dip but recover. By opening this evolutionary pathway we could enhance the mosquitoes in unintended ways. 2. Some males will evolve genes which disable the sterilization gene. By opening this evolutionary pathway we could enhance the mosquitoes in unintended ways.
- asdff 5y ago
  Populations are always mutating at the same rate and selection is always occurring no matter what you do.

deleted 5y ago

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DominoTree 5y ago

They’ve been releasing mosquitoes sterilized via various means for decades to do population control - this isn’t as extreme as people make it out to be

RcouF1uZ4gsC 5y ago

What many people fail to consider is the alternatives to this. There is no scenario where the US and Florida government are just going to say that mosquito born illness is just a fact of life and we just have to life with it. Mosquito control efforts will happen. Right now that involves spraying a bunch of pesticides everywhere. If the mosquitos develop resistance, likely new pesticides with potential more environmental effects will be used. In fact, one of the reasons DDT was used so widely throughout the US was for mosquito control. What these genetically engineered mosquitos offer is a chance for a more surgical, more environmentally friendly mosquito control option. Instead of massive spraying that kills not only disease causing mosquitoes but likely harms a lot of other bystander species as well, if we can specifically target the biting, disease carrying mosquitos effectively, both humans and the environment will be better off.

TaylorAlexander 5y ago
I mean that’s the story if all goes well. But these things tend to have unintended consequences. Your comments about eradicating this so-called pest sound similar to the arguments for mass fumigation of DDT. “This harmless solution will eliminate pests that plague humans.” But then it turned out collapsing ecosystems was bad and it also nearly drove the Peregrine Falcon to extinction because it would accumulate in their bodies and damaged their eggs. So sure. Assuming we know all the possible downsides the happy story makes sense. But we keep finding out that we don’t know all the downsides in advance. In nature, everything is connected. We have a long history of thinking simple technological solutions will solve our problems, and especially in nature that kind of thinking has led to environmental disaster time and time again.
- RcouF1uZ4gsC 5y ago
  > But then it turned out collapsing ecosystems was bad and it also nearly drove the Peregrine Falcon to extinction because it would accumulate in their bodies and damaged their eggs. I would argue, that the benefit of cutting down endemic malaria and yellow fever in the United States and the lives said and the people who did not get sick was worth the risk to the Peregrine Falcon. In nature, everything is connected. But to believe that it is too connected for humans to be able to successfully manipulate the environment for our benefit is anti-science. Growing more food, curing disease, increasing human longevity does have follow-on effects for nature, but I would argue that manipulation of Nature for human’s benefit is something we as humans can and should do. Yes, we should be aware of unintended side effects, but we cannot let ourselves be paralyzed by fear.

fogof 5y ago

It seems like, barring some effect of the fluorescent marker gene on reproductive fitness, the proportion of instances of this gene in the male mosquito population doesn't naturally decrease over time. Given this, perhaps its possible this measure will eventually eradicate the Aedes aegypti in the Keys, through genetic drift.

move-on-by 5y ago

I remember reading about this when Zika was new and my wife was pregnant. I’m excited about it and hope the science of it proves out with proper due diligence. Social distancing and use of masks certainly won’t aid with mosquito spread diseases. Furthermore, widespread use of pesticides is devastating to desirable insects, particularly bees. Having a tool to control the mosquito population that doesn’t directly impact other insects would certainly be a win in my book.

mtillman 5y ago

This is great news! Finally, the US is using a solution common to the rest of the developed world. Did someone on this thread honestly say inter-species procreation? Has HN become Nextdoor?

bawolff 5y ago
Well i dont think its a reasonable worry here, where precisely do you think mules come from?
strictnein 5y ago
> inter-species procreation I mean, that's a thing. Ligers, mules, etc. And where, exactly, is this "common" in the rest of the "developed" world? Best I could Google is that France and other EU countries approved its use just ~3.5 years ago: https://www.labiotech.eu/more-news/genetically-modified-mosquitoes-oxitec-netherlands/ https://www.labiotech.eu/more-news/genetically-modified-mosq...

DubiousPusher 5y ago

> “When something new and revolutionary comes along, the immediate reaction of a lot of people is to say: ‘Wait.’,” I don't think novelty is the problem here. Humans have a genuinely terrible track record of ecosystem engineering. Unintended consequences are pretty common.

mc32 5y ago
Hmmmm African killer bees... On the other hand, these are males whose female offspring are designed to die. If they were regular male mosquitoes their female offspring would have the same survival rate as males. So the bad scenario is the female offspring survive as normal. The super bad scenario is they only beget female mosquitoes I guess. Yes that would be worse.
- silasdavis 5y ago
  We can make a better disaster film script than that. How about some rare second generation females survive then turn out to be far more potent disease carriers and rebuild a population of super mosquitoes in their place. Mosquitoes are buggers though.
  - pvaldes 5y ago
    I liked the part where the infertility genes somehow manage to contaminate the human DNA and both humans and condom market collapse at the same time, yep...
    - breischl 5y ago
      >both humans and condom market collapse at the same time lol, I like your framing of that. I can just picture the headlines: HUMANITY TO BE ERADICATED!!!!! Also, condom sales fall
  - wildmanx 5y ago
    Or what about this experiment actually working, this specific species going extinct (or at least driven out), and that 4% nice that's now empty gets taken over by another type of mosquitoes or other type of insect that has the bad properties you describe? Not too unlikely as we tend to have no clue what will happen when we eco-engineer something away. And if we think we have a clue, it tends to be wrong. Or what about this: they go extinct/away and it turns out there was some predator that now doesn't get food anymore and is decimated while their competition gets now out of hand? Next pest please.

gadf 5y ago

Then the Lord said to Moses, “Get up early in the morning and confront Pharaoh as he goes to the river and say to him, ‘This is what the Lord says: Let my people go, so that they may worship me. If you do not let my people go, I will send swarms of flies on you and your officials, on your people and into your houses. The houses of the Egyptians will be full of flies; even the ground will be covered with them.

gorgoiler 5y ago

Who underwrites this kind of experiment? I can’t imagine that the FKMCD or Oxitec have liability insurance that covers the externalities of modifying wildlife. They also don’t have the manpower but I see this comes under the umbrella of the EPA and therefore the Federal Government. That gives some assurance that if a Really Bad Thing happens, there will be global-scale resources to implement a cleanup.

thatguy0900 5y ago
It's certainly comforting to know that when a company does a ecological really bad thing it's actually cleaned up and not just ignored and swept under the rug by both governments and the corporation.

bedobi 5y ago

Countless species are already going extinct all the time, both known to us and completely unknown to us, and both "naturally" and from human impact, and no one really cares. Here's a rare case of a species that there is very good reason to deliberately get rid of, and suddenly people care and object, a lot!? Of course there's justifiable skepticism and a long, sorry history of unintended consequences of introducing, eradicating or in any way modifying a species or its behavior, but seriously, read up on it, this is not one of those species, pretty much everyone who knows anything about it (including otherwise very environmentally minded people who as a rule would never, ever agree with deliberately eradicating anything) agrees it can be eradicated with no meaningful impact on the ecosystem. (and yes, that includes even the armchair criticism from cynical misanthropes who consider human deaths resulting from this species a good thing "because humans are bad for the environment" - while these mosquitoes do cause a lot of human deaths, the environmental "benefit" of those deaths are completely meaningless in the grand scheme of things)

artificialLimbs 5y ago
70 years ago (roughly, may be inexact), everyone who also "knows anything about it" said it was a fantastic idea to spray our kids with DDT. I wish I could pin down the reasoning to explain why I feel this is wrong, but intuition is the only thing I have to go on, even as heavily discounted that is in this day and age. Mosquitos are horrible little devils, and we swat every one we can and destroy their habitats when we find them. Glad to see you at least have a seed of skepticism in you. Humans are notoriously bad at playing god.
- tick_tock_tick 5y ago
  I feel like you are are ignoring the fact DDT is still commonly used around the world as it does more good then harm.
  - deleted 5y ago
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  - jacobolus 5y ago

07121941 5y ago

I might be duct taping two buzzwords but could GMO mosquitoes carry mrna packages???

jcims 5y ago
Probably not directly as it would have to be something that can survive or be expressed through the mouth parts of the mosquito. Malaria spreads from human to human through a mosquito because the parasite (known as plasmodium) that causes it is ingested from one human then reproduces outside the reach of the mosquitos immune system. If a benign organism evolves or could be developed to do the same, that organism could be genetically modified to create and/or express the intended antigens as exosomes. When it spreads to humans, these particles would be emitted and presumably detected by the human's immune system. From: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plasmodium https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plasmodium >In the mosquito, the gametocytes move along with the blood meal to the mosquito's midgut. Here the gametocytes develop into male and female gametes which fertilize each other, forming a zygote. Zygotes then develop into a motile form called an ookinete, which penetrates the wall of the midgut. Upon traversing the midgut wall, the ookinete embeds into the gut's exterior membrane and develops into an oocyst. Oocysts divide many times to produce large numbers of small elongated sporozoites. These sporozoites migrate to the salivary glands of the mosquito where they can be injected into the blood of the next host the mosquito bites, repeating the cycle. From: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5253278/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5253278/ >In the context of immune responses against pathogens, exosomes also carries pathogen antigens and known to evoke immune responses. Mycobacterium bovis BCG-infected macrophages release EVs containing mycobacterial antigen that, in the presence of DCs, promote T-cell immunity in mice (10). Regarding the topic at hand, I'm curious if mosquitoes play a role in innoculating their hosts with very small pathogen loads that are quickly killed off by the immunological response to the bite, but also foster antibody creation and help to spread immunity.

AbrahamParangi 5y ago

I am not against this, but I will play devil's advocate on behalf of the mosquitos. In 1958 the Four Pests Campaign called for the elimination of four pests, one of which was the sparrow. Sparrows were accused of consuming grain and as a result were targeted for elimination. A popular sparrow hunting campaign led to the near extinction of the Eurasian tree sparrow in China. Shortly afterwards locust populations boomed, now missing one of their principle predators. The "smash sparrows campaign" is credited with worsening the Great Chinese Famine, which saw somewhere between 15 and 55 million people die. The people who smashed sparrows believed it was correct just as surely as we believe anything today.

robotcookies 5y ago
We should save some of the mosquitoes in labs in case there are unintended consequences. Then if needed, they can be bred and brought back to the environment.
- throwanem 5y ago
  The world has no shortage of Aedes aegypti. The intent here isn't to annihilate the species worldwide, but to eradicate it from a specific region in which it is harmfully invasive.
SoylentYellow 5y ago
On the other hand, consider that the screwworm barrier has been a huge success: https://www.nationalgeographic.com/animals/article/north-american-screwworm-barrier https://www.nationalgeographic.com/animals/article/north-ame...
ppseafield 5y ago
This one species is not native to the Keys and is responsible for nearly all the mosquito-bourne illness there. If this kills every single mosquito of this species, 96% of the total mosquito population will remain. > ...suppressing populations of wild Aedes aegypti mosquitoes, which can carry diseases such as Zika, dengue, chikungunya and yellow fever. > Aedes aegypti makes up about 4% of the mosquito population in the Keys, a chain of tropical islands off the southern tip of Florida. But it is responsible for practically all mosquito-borne disease transmitted to humans in the region

yawnxyz 5y ago

I was in the Keys in a townhall meeting when everything went down between the residents and Oxitec. I just remember the Oxitec management and scientists, with their British accents and their old school suits, really stood out like cartoon villains. What everyone wanted was more studies and data to assure the ecosystem wouldn't get screwed up, and basically it came down to a chicken and the egg problem. Oxitec knew they needed more data, but they couldn't produce the data until it was released in the Keys. I don't anyone at the meeting was anti-science, they were just not convinced Oxitec had the well-being of the residents in mind.

TheJoeMan 5y ago
We must have attended different meetings. I watched people think they were going to turn into mosquito peter parker. I do agree on the conundrum about needing more data, and I think the Keys is a fantastic place to try.

hassancf 5y ago

What could go wrong? Actually what went wrong in 2020 already: <<They found that some of the genes from the genetically modified mosquitoes had transferred to the native population. In other words, some of the offspring had survived and were strong enough to reproduce. This new population is a hybrid of Brazilian mosquitoes and the genetically modified mosquitoes that were created from strains in Cuba and Mexico, according to the study, which was published Sept. 10 in the journal Scientific Reports. "The claim was that genes from the release strain would not get into the general population because offspring would die," senior author Jeffrey Powell, a professor of ecology and evolutionary biology at Yale University, said in a statement. "That obviously was not what happened." >> Source: https://www.livescience.com/genetically-modified-mosquitoes-create-hybrids.html https://www.livescience.com/genetically-modified-mosquitoes-... So we are not really sure that this company knows what they are doing. See also : https://twitter.com/vtchakarova/status/1297275503267713028?s=21 https://twitter.com/vtchakarova/status/1297275503267713028?s...

cycrutchfield 5y ago
> This method has successfully reduced native mosquito populations in Brazil by up to 85%, the researchers wrote. What’s the issue?
- hassancf 5y ago
  This is the issue: <<But it is the unanticipated outcome that is concerning," Powell added. In fact, the genes that were passed on weren't the tweaked genes that were designed to kill and tag the mosquitoes but rather genes from the strains in Cuba and Mexico, according to Science magazine. The researchers also noted that this mixing of genes might have led to a "more robust population," perhaps one that would be better able to resist insecticides or transmit diseases, Science magazine reported. >> https://www.livescience.com/genetically-modified-mosquitoes-create-hybrids.html https://www.livescience.com/genetically-modified-mosquitoes-... In other words, something they didn’t expect happened. What else will happen that they did not expect?
- pvaldes 5y ago
  I would seriously doubt any claiming coming from Brazil in this context of anti-science aligned government and fake news scenery.

dang 5y ago

Recent and related: First GMO Mosquitoes to Be Released in the Florida Keys - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26834413 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26834413 - April 2021 (126 comments) 750M genetically engineered mosquitoes approved for release in Florida Keys - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24218044 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24218044 - Aug 2020 (13 comments)

walterbell 5y ago

Oxitec's GMO mosquitos were previously released in Brazil (450,000 during 2013-2015) and lead to unplanned genetic contamination of the local mosquito population, https://gizmodo.com/genetically-modified-mosquitoes-are-breeding-in-brazil-1838146152 https://gizmodo.com/genetically-modified-mosquitoes-are-bree... > tests conducted by Oxitec prior to the experiment suggested that around 3 to 4 percent of F1 offspring would survive into adulthood, but it was presumed these lingering mosquitoes would be too weak to reproduce, rendering them infertile. These predictions, as the new research shows, were wrong … portions of the genome from the transgenic strain had “incorporated into the target population,” ... anywhere from 10 to 60 percent of mosquitoes analyzed featured genomes tainted by OX513A … the Oxitec scheme worked at first, resulting in a dramatic reduction in the size of the mosquito population. But at the 18-month mark, the population began to recover, returning to nearly pre-release levels. According to the paper, this was on account of a phenomenon known as “mating discrimination,” in which females of the native species began to avoid mating with modified males.

kungito 5y ago
this is like, the first thought you have when thinking about this problem. why would the females choose the infected one
- 0-_-0 5y ago
  Because they can't tell the difference. It's not obvious that they can evolve to tell the difference until you try.
  - trhway 5y ago
    >Because they can't tell the difference. you're kidding. I mean to people of course all mosquito look the same. It is a top of anthropocentrism though to think that mosquito would not differentiate. The basis of selection is "best fit" (to bring in and/or bring up new generation), and the weakness to the point of infertility is naturally selected out very quickly.

chmod600 5y ago

It seems like such a thing could come about as a natural mutation. How would evolution normally get rid of such destructive genes?

p1mrx 5y ago
If a species produces an excessive number of males, then it becomes advantageous to produce more females to mate with them, so evolution is always nudging them back to a 50:50 ratio: https://www.blackwellpublishing.com/ridley/tutorials/Adaptations_in_sexual_reproduction26.asp https://www.blackwellpublishing.com/ridley/tutorials/Adaptat... So I guess the idea behind genetic engineering is to destabilize the ratio and wipe out the species faster than natural evolution can respond. I would suggest reading "The Selfish Gene", which covers a lot of topics like this.
silasdavis 5y ago
It would remove those less fit. I think the point of the effect only being at second generation is that it makes the lack of fitness signal weaker in these males than ordinarily sterilised males. Added to that they keep releasing the modified mosquitoes so they are more numerous (in effect more fit since they have a massive breeding advantage from the humans breeding them).

claaams 5y ago

I hope I live long enough to see how disastrously this backfires.

dukeofdoom 5y ago

Fun fact, mosquitos pollinate blueberries in Alaska.

BoorishBears 5y ago
This comment sure got shorter... But yeah, I honestly don't care what mosquitos do that's useful, we should eradicate them. The sheer scale of human suffering they've brought via disease transmission is just too great. Malaria makes COVID look like cooties. We've "accidentally" eradicated much more beneficial species than mosquitos, this is the very last place to start taking a stand.
bedobi 5y ago
Fun fact, these mosquitoes are not pollinators, they're an invasive species, constitute only a tiny fraction of the mosquito population where they exist, and don't fill any meaningful ecological role.

TedShiller 5y ago

What could possibly go wrong?

alpb 5y ago

Are we sure these are the first? Verily labs (subsidiary of Alphabet) already released these mosquitoes back in 2017 in Bay Area https://www.theverge.com/2017/7/14/15972950/mosquitoes-google-alphabet-verily-debug-wolbachia-bacteria-fresno-california https://www.theverge.com/2017/7/14/15972950/mosquitoes-googl....

_Microft 5y ago

Mosquitoes do not cause Malaria, they transmit the parasite that does. Eradicating mosquitoes is like wanting to shoot the messenger. It especially sad to read this a week or two after the announcement that a Malaria vaccine with good efficacy is undergoing trials with good success. But I guess the successes at creating a better vaccine only mean that these people will try to accelerate their scheme before there is no reason anymore to actually have to unleash their new toy on the world.

rofws 5y ago

Do mosquitos aid the ecosystem in any other way, apart from being food for insects?

bedobi 5y ago
No. This species is invasive everywhere outside Africa, constitutes only a tiny fraction of the mosquito population where they exist, and doesn't fill any meaningful ecological role anywhere.
bourgoin 5y ago
We don't really know. Complex ecological systems are relatively poorly understood.

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

dagorenouf 5y ago

Now that sounds like a good idea. /s

webreac 5y ago

There are studies. Killing some species of mosquitoes may be entirely beneficial. But if this happens to succeed, what will be next ? Will we use this technology to eradicate another specie and discover too late that this one was very important ? We are creating a precedent. I favor eradicating some species of mosquitoes, but this should stop there. My worry is that human is rarely able to stop after a success. What will be the failure that will cause us to stop ? How devastating will be this failure ?

viktorcode 5y ago

Many people have raised concerns about introducing modified genes into mosquito population, but nobody seems to care about insecticides usage on mass scale, which leads to proliferation of resistant mosquitos by means of evolution. I think the bias is that in the first example mosquito genes are considered unnatural, yet in the second nobody cares about genome. "Not directly manipulated means natural"

highmastdon 5y ago
Exactly! I think a lot of problems that we have currently are being tackled by fighting symptoms instead of looking at the source. We can't make the world around us work in our ways. We'd be much better off working with the worlds way and improving upon that. With this mosquito problem, I can think of multiple things that need to change: insecticides, herbicides that influence the places where birds nest, birds and other small animals are affected by both insecticides and herbicides because their habitat is being destroyed. Herbicides influence the ground on which we grow crops, the ground gets infertile, fungi and small ground animals aren't working the ground to keep it strong and a welcoming habitat for the whole food chain. As long as we keep killing the smallest in the food chain, we kill eventually the bigger ones, and leave ourselves with problems like this.
- bedobi 5y ago
  This species is invasive everywhere outside Africa, constitutes only a tiny fraction of the mosquito population where they exist, and doesn't fill any meaningful ecological role anywhere.

Cadwhisker 5y ago

I reject the idea that humans should make mosquitos extinct; they are a key part of the food chain. If that's not a good enough reason, I have a dumb hypothesis that mosquitos have played a part in evolution for millions of years, based on the premise that they spread viruses/retroviruses and retroviruses are capable of modifying DNA. They also spread other diseases which may cause certain genetic lines to survive over others. This hypothesis could be complete junk, but who is going to be able to run a scientific experiment that would take 10,000 years or more? The food chain reason is immediately obvious, but is anyone considering the impact over massive timescales?

bedobi 5y ago
Then you will be glad to hear that no one is proposing eradicating mosquitoes! What's being proposed it eradicating a single invasive mosquito species that doesn't belong in the ecosystem in question, constitutes only a tiny fraction of the mosquito population where they exist, and doesn't fill any meaningful ecological role anywhere! Instead of indiscriminately drenching entire ecosystems in DDT and other substances with god knows what effects. As for mosquitoes playing a part in evolution... Just what? I also note that you probably don't live in the affected areas. Sorry, but your feeling good about your ideological tastes being satisfied isn't worth more than literally millions of lives every year.
- globular-toast 5y ago
  > As for mosquitoes playing a part in evolution... Just what? It sounds like a very plausible theory to me. Horizontal gene transfer is now well-known in bacteria. We know the tree of life is a vast oversimplification of the real processes that drive evolution. Why would you so quickly dismiss this idea?
  - bedobi 5y ago
    Even ignoring this species is invasive everywhere outside Africa, constitutes only a tiny fraction of the mosquito population where they exist, and doesn't fill any meaningful ecological role anywhere... The rest of the planet that has never had this mosquito are basically in danger then, from inability to "evolve", and humans shouldn't live in those areas lest they lose out on evolution? Will you move to an affected area to make sure you don't miss out?

coward76 5y ago

Burmese python and Kudzu, what could go wrong. We don't exactly have a good track record on this kind of thing.

myfavoritedog 5y ago

Oxitec mosquitoes carry a fluorescent marker gene that makes them glow when exposed to a specific colour of light, which makes identification easier. Should be interesting to see how long before the females develop the ability to detect and shun fluorescence. Then we can market fluorescent clothing as not only being pedestrian safe gear, but also mosquito repellent.

yosito 5y ago
As it turns out, fluorescent clothing is already a good choice to repel mosquitoes. Dark colors are notoriously bad to wear if you're going into mosquito territory.

matthewfelgate 5y ago

I've seen that movie. I bet it's got The Rock in it.

dbingham 5y ago

Honestly, I'm kind of surprised that any software engineer could be okay with us releasing anything genetically engineered into the wild. We can't manage systems that we designed to be highly decoupled and very manageable with out introducing bugs or triggering unintended consequences (sometime pretty catastrophic to the system in question). These are systems we ought to know everything about, because we built them, and that we've intentionally designed in such a way that a fault in one part of it shouldn't affect other parts of it. And yet, we often find they do in ways we never would have predicted. I'm talking here, of course, about software. Genetic code is a system we don't fully understand, that's vastly more complex than any of the software systems we've built, and that is highly coupled in ways we're only just beginning to understand. Tweak a gene that we're pretty sure does one thing, and it can have effects in completely unrelated systems we never would have predicted. And yet, we're going to mess around in that system and then release it out into wild ecosystems (another highly complex and highly coupled system that we don't fully understand). Ecosystems that we don't completely control. We have no rollback ability for these releases. No way to undo it. And we have no way to thoroughly test these changes impacts on the systems. Even in a culture with the mentality "move fast and break things" we don't act this cavalierly towards the systems we're working in. It's absolutely insane to behave this way. And it's only a matter of time before it bites us in the ass in a truly catastrophic way.

itsangaris 5y ago
The mRNA vaccines are genetically engineered, as is a lot of our agriculture. I see your point but that’s why this test was so heavily regulated by the FDA and had to conduct many trails before it was allowed to proceed.
- dbingham 5y ago
  Yeah, I'm not arguing for abandoning genetic engineering entirely. The potential for it change the world in beneficial ways is huge. The mRNA vaccines are a great example where the risk is worth the reward and the possibilities of unintended consequences is relatively low. But our agriculture is a great example of an area where we should exercising way more caution than we are. There are unintended consequences we're already seeing, and further consequences that are impossible to predict.

loudtieblahblah 5y ago

do ticks next.

ViViDboarder 5y ago

How is this the first? Didn’t a Google do this in 2017? https://offgridsurvival.com/google-releases-20-million-genetically-engineered-mosquitos/ https://offgridsurvival.com/google-releases-20-million-genet...

SavantIdiot 5y ago

It is important to try it. As stated in the article, this only targets one invasive species that is 4% of the mosquito population in that region. That's a fairly focused application that probably hasn't had time or the volume to disrupt the ecosystem from its original introduction. Seems like a perfect test case.

elpakal 5y ago

Currently reading "The Mosquito: A Human History of Our Deadliest Predator" By Timothy Winegard, and in it he suggests that the mosquito was introduced by Columbus and is not native to the Americas. If this is true (I dunno if it is), I wonder if it changes the opinion of anyone arguing against this because of the "tampering with nature" angle.

EricE 5y ago

Search for Judas Goats and the Galapagos Islands. Would be hard to do the same to mosquitoes due to the size and quantity but same concept :p

OnlyMortal 5y ago

“What could possibly go wrong?”