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Results from first US trial of genetically modified mosquitoes
- Flatcircle 5y agoThis should be a bigger story, the aedes mosquito has exploded in growth in the Los Angeles area. Horrible quality of life issue. We need to do everything we can to eradicate this invasive species. Also we did something similar with an invasive fruit fly in the 80's I believe and it was a success.
- foolzcrow 5y ago
- kickout 5y agoVery cool. This type of thinking and combining next-gen tools in the genome editing space will be time well spent. Hopefully there is a future state where pesticides can ultimately be reduced because of this tech. Obviously engineering pests of agriculture/horticulture crops would be a high-value target, so curious if this research helps jumpstart those ideas and startups.
- svnt 5y agoAll this does is introduce novel mutations and then drive a population bottleneck. We are simply evolving the mosquito. The only way this could help is if it pushes it out of a local evolutionary maximum where it is a host for this virus. That seems unlikely as the mutation appears optimized for intragenomic conflict instead. It is Russian roulette with mosquitos.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- refurb 5y agoIntragenomic conflict?
- svnt 5y agoIt is roughly opposite of inclusive fitness in genetic selection. An extension of the selfish gene theory.
- bratwurst3000 5y agoHow shall this genetic mutation that they are doing induce other genetic mutations in relation to that most femals die and in generall? Or do you meant the virus is mutating for a new host? If not, is there some genetic math that could explaine your point? I am courios :) Edit: because muation is more or less random and is expressed with new generations. So if they die and there is less the chance of mutation or am i wrong??
- svnt 5y agoGenes often bring along adjacent unrelated genetic information when they mutate because heritability for various reasons does not always respect the integrity of a gene.
- jjoonathan 5y agoI "merely drive a population bottleneck" every time I brush my teeth. I am simply evolving the bacteria! It's like Russian Roulette! Thank you for bringing my attention to this matter. I will stop brushing immediately and let my breath stink and teeth rot forevermore.
- justinpowers 5y agoYou jest but you’re wiser than you realize, especially if you include a diet change as part of the driver. Good diet (no sugars) and avoidance of broad-spectrum bactericides will allow good bacteria to thrive, pushing out the bad smelly ones. People have noticed similar beneficial responses, ie lack of disgusting body odor, when quitting hot soapy showers or the use of antiperspirants. Just gotta make sure diet goes with it. Along with general common sense cleanliness.
- zionic 5y ago>good bacteria I’ve seen evidence for this in the gut, WRT digestion and such. What possible basis could exist for there being “good” bacteria in your mouth? It’s still going to do damage even if it doesn’t offgas sulfur. Long term I imagine we’ll genetically engineer our offspring to produce all the required enzymes for healthy digestion without reliance on 3rd party organisms.
- justinpowers 5y agoThere’s good (and bad) bacteria all over our bodies. Our skin is coated with them and needs to be coated with them. Without the good ones on our skin, bad ones take over, and then any cuts become more likely to get infected. I’ll update later with a source reference or two. But I’m willing to bet that Wikipedia‘s “skin flora” page has good info. Im not sure of the term for the mouth’s flora though…but I have zero doubt that it exists, simply because bacteria is everywhere. And gut bacteria get there via the mouth. Long story short, there’s no such thing as a pure human. We exist only because we are colonized by bacteria. We’re kind of like the earth in that regard. We house living organisms and they make us what we are, without them homeostasis crumbles and so do we. So, with that in mind, we should be selectively helping the good ones and killing the bad, instead of wiping them all out. Regarding replacing the gut bacteria with suitable enzymes for digestion, that would probably be misguided. The bacteria do more than just help digestion… they also keep bad bacteria out. And furthermore, they actually affect our mental health, keeping depression at bay for instance. Whether that’s indirectly via suppressing inflammation or some more direct means, I don’t recall. Edit: Looks like it’s a much more direct means of influence: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31100533 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31100533 (There doesn’t seem to be much about this here on HN already, so I’m providing a source via HN submission in hopes of generating some discussion…)
- Symmetry 5y agoUsually populations evolve resistance to pathogens or toxins via intermediate steps where some mutation delivers partial protection and the organism can build on that to higher and higher doses. Expose a population of bacteria to a large dose of antibiotics and they all just die, it's when you give them a small but increasing dose that they develop resistance. By contrast having children of both sexes or just one is binary (at least among those that will go on to create a third generation) so there really isn't that same potential for intermediate steps. Plus, we can look into the fossil record and see species die out from causes sort of like this. Many species have evolved pure asexual reproduction. This provides a fitness boost to the individuals who no longer have to spend energy on mating, but the lack of genetic recombination inevitably causes extinction in a million years or so. Not exactly the same as what we're trying to do here but it's still the closest analogy available.
- svnt 5y agoAll we are doing is selecting for females who can avoid the genetic mutation by some means. I’m not worried about the loss of a mosquito species, I’m just saying it is a waste of time and the wrong approach.
- Symmetry 5y agoWould you say that dumping disinfectant in a petri dish is just selecting for bacteria resistant to disinfectant? If a mutation arises that prevents the sex selection process then sure, the mosquito populations can recover. But whether such a mutation arises before the species is wiped out is an open question. And we can put multiple different gene drive mechanisms into the males requiring multiple simultaneous mutations to evade which aren't selected for until all are present, making the chance of such an evasion as unlikely as we need if we're willing to put the effort in.
- LoveGracePeace 5y agoJeff Goldblum's character in Jurassic Park was right.
- idontwantthis 5y agoNot according to this article.
- mrfusion 5y agoNothing has held back science and progress more than that one quote in that one movie. Pretty amazing if you think about it.
- mysterydip 5y agoAre you saying science should progress regardless of consequences?
- mrfusion 5y agoNot at all. I’m saddened that a jurrasic park comparison shuts down all debate without considering the merits or risks.
- mysterydip 5y agoGotcha. I didn't see it as shutting down all debate, I saw it as exactly what you said: considering merits and risks.
- zionic 5y agoI think this goes well beyond just this movie. Humans seem highly vulnerable, especially when in groups, to thought-terminating cliches like this. I wonder how you fight against it?
- dekhn 5y agothat is not a reasonable conclusion from what the person you are replying to said. Bad faith comment.
- Linda703 5y ago[flagged]
- inglor_cz 5y agoI wonder if we could instead produce mosquitoes that hate human smell and never attack humans. The risk that something else and worse starts moving into the ecological niche left empty by nonviable mosquitoes would be reduced.
- bratwurst3000 5y agoI was also thinking about that. And what if mosquitoes have important role in nature? But Honestly I hate those bastards so much, A world without them would be a delight.
- ParksNet 5y agohttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aedes_aegypti https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aedes_aegypti The targeted species of mosquito is not native to the USA. It was introduced by Europeans inadvertently.
- ceejayoz 5y agoTo be fair, that does hint at the potential for the modified version to get introduced back to Europe inadvertently.
- Tagbert 5y agoThere are over 800 species of Mosquitos and only a couple of species can transmit diseases to humans. The Aegyptes species targeted in this test is invasive in the Americas and not a native mosquito. If we could eliminate this species it would prevent most cases of a deadly disease and would have little to no environmental effect. Other creatures that depend on mosquitos would continue to consume the other 799 species.
- mistrial9 5y agowhy did mainstream news articles say repeatedly "GMO Mosquitos may be released in California" .. at the same time as they were being released, which was planned for years.
- ddoolin 5y agoAccording to this article, they are planning on a second test in Visalia, CA, which has not happened yet.
- programmarchy 5y ago“First they came for the mosquitos, but I said nothing because I was not a mosquito.” A bit tongue in cheek, but there are ethical issues raised by wiping out species. Next mice, then wild hogs, then on to other “pests”.
- aaronchall 5y agoThat's the problem when a slippery slope becomes a landslide and next thing you know, the sky is falling.
- andresgottlieb 5y ago“First they came for the lettuce, but I said nothing because I was not a lettuce.” A bit tongue in cheek, but there are ethical issues raised by eating living beings. Next fish, then chicken, then on to other “food”.
- kickout 5y agoWe kill entire species all the time as humanity, often unnoticed. I think its better that we have a explicit reason for doing so.
- eimrine 5y agoWait a minute, they decided just to kill that insects? Not just to modify them for being not virus-carrying? And nobody is afraid of Chinese-sparrow problem or Australian problem with frogs or cats? I am not a real scientist to have something to say about it, but from history no experiment like that has a successful result. edit I understood it is an invasible specie exactly as Australian cats and frogs.
- micromacrofoot 5y agothey're an invasive species that previously didn't even exist on the same continent
- CWuestefeld 5y agoAs long as those little bastards are around, I'm going to keep using a broad-spectrum pesticide that wreaks a ton of collateral damage. As the saying goes, pick your poison. Also, the species they're doing this with is an invasive species. Assuming that they haven't completely supplanted the natives ones (and I think this holds true), there shouldn't be any impact on the ecosystem.
- the_only_law 5y agoI wouldn’t be surprised if I’ve accidentally damaged my own brain engaging in chemical warfare against insects.
- davedx 5y ago> there shouldn't be any impact on the ecosystem. How can you say that? Did you simulate the effect of this mosquito species being wiped out? Did the people running the study? We never learn
- fullstop 5y agoTwo things: 1. I agree that we never learn, and that every time we've tried to do this sort of thing there has been unintended consequences. 2. You likely live in an area without mosquitoes. They are one of the largest vectors for disease on the planet, and I wouldn't feel bad if they ceased to exist.
- BurningFrog 5y agoThe first fact you need to know about this: There are ~800 mosquito species. This is about removing 1 of them which can and do carry diseases that kill people. If this is successful, the ecological niche left by Aedes aegypti will be filled by other mosquito species, and no ecological disaster will occur.
- sorokod 5y agoThing is, smashing the existing equilibrium is not good or bad, just as nature is not good or bad. Most likely a new equilibrium will be established without checking with us, humans. We, may like it less then the original one though.
- davedx 5y ago> If this is successful, the ecological niche left by Aedes aegypti will be filled by other mosquito species, and no ecological disaster will occur. Isn't that what people always say before interfering with ecosystems? I mean you might be right, but how can you possibly make such a huge claim like that?
- ceejayoz 5y agoWe've inadvertently wiped out a whole bunch of species, and nearly done so to a whole bunch more. These have had ecological impact, but one more isn't gonna make or break things, especially having specifically done the research in this case in a way we didn't for most of the extinct species. We've got concrete examples of getting rid of some species with near-zero consequences, like the guinea worm.
- artificialLimbs 5y agoNear zero consequences of which we are aware.
- danans 5y agoPhrases like "near zero consequences" usually implicitly refer to the consequences for human populations, domestic animals, or species that have cultural value to us or are canaries in coal mines (i.e. polar bears). As long as the macro-ecological systems we rely on continue to interface with us in mostly the same way we make the compromise that we are aware enough of the side effects. It's easier to take this perspective with disease carrying mosquitos because of the sheer quantity of human suffering and death they cause. But this view does have pitfalls, like how we initially missed the collapse of pollinator species that we depend on, or the risks we take with genetically cloned fruit like Cavendish bananas which are a single pathogen away from being wiped out.
- throwthere 5y agoCliff notes that hopefully clarify some things-- This concerns an invasive mosquito (Aedes aegypti) that carries dengue/yellow fever/zika and more. Males were raised with a mutation that, passed on to offspring, kills females before reach adulthood (and have grandchildren). They released this on 1 hectacre of land, the genes functioned as expected, and the genes didn't travel more than 400m (affected mosquitoes have a sort of fluorescence under the right light). Probably also as expected, the genes disappeared after a year (a few generations). My guess is that mostly happened from neighboring unmodified Aedes aegypti mosquitoes genes coming over to replace the modified ones. AFAIK it'd take a monumental effort to wipe out a species this way, but suppressing or near-eliminating a population in a place you can isolate from non-modified aegypti sounds possible, particularly if you do other suppressive efforts.
- engineer_22 5y agoGreat TLDR thanks! Sounds like a great business to be in, GMO mosquitoes will need to be constantly reintroduced to keep down the reproduction quotient.
- RosanaAnaDana 5y agoYeah it seems like a kind of contradiction if you want this to be ecologically effective. You can't simultaneously have the phenotype severely impact reproductive success and be super effective in controlling the population.
- wongarsu 5y agoWhich is great for a risk-management standpoint: the modified genes will only spread through great human effort, there's no scenario where there's unintended side-effects and we can't stop the spread.
- outworlder 5y agoIt's great actually. We just have to keep applying the 'treatment' in affected areas. Rather than having it spread uncontrollably.
- 5y ago
- mherdeg 5y agoThe place where the CDC left us on Zika is kind of strange. It seems like they basically stopped surveillance and left up a snapshot ( https://wwwnc.cdc.gov/travel/page/zika-travel-information https://wwwnc.cdc.gov/travel/page/zika-travel-information ). As far as I can tell, the current travel recommendation is that if you visit the Caribbean you should avoid conceiving a child for 2-3 mo (the guidance would also apply to Puerto Rico except I don't think that counts as "abroad"). But surely no one is actually doing that...? And there now is evidence for widespread teratogenic effects ( https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa2101195 https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa2101195 ) and we just... Gave up? Kind of wild.
- tiahura 5y agoZika made it to the Americas via a Rugby tournament in Tahiti. Virtually everyone in Tahiti got it, and there were no brainless babies born. Zika was largely a press inspired mass panic.
- nomel 5y agoThere are several Zika vaccines going through trials. The CDC doesn't, and should probably never, develop vaccines.
- snapetom 5y agoFrom a libertarian philosophical standpoint I like this, but I'd like to know more practical reasons. Is it just the fact that it's a massive amount of R&D that's only recouped from sales and marketing?
- nomel 5y agoFor me, beyond recouping the costs, I think the CDC has demonstrated that it is too tightly coupled with politics [1][2]. I believe that any government body will eventually become constrained by the politics that it exists in and is funded by. I would, naively, claim that funding more neutral researchers/companies would provide better resistance to the politics of it all. As a counter argument, it would be easy to claim that the pharmaceutical companies are too tightly coupled to politicians. Perhaps this still results in greater efficiency, for now? 1. https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/we-cant-allow-the-cdc-to-be-tainted-by-politics/ https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/we-cant-allow-the... 2. https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/16/us/politics/cdc-trump.html https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/16/us/politics/cdc-trump.htm...
- photochemsyn 5y agoAlternative view: infectious diseases have been around throughout the entire history of humanity, and have played an important ecological role in human history, namely controlling population size (particularly under famine conditions, when humans become more susceptible to disease) and maintaining genetic diversity (since a more homogenous population may be more susceptible to epidemics). If we're going to use technology to eliminate infectious disease (and to increase food production) then an absolute necessity will be for humans to control their population growth by other means, perhaps legal (as with the China one-child policy, etc.). Yes, that's all very controversial, but it should really be discussed.
- ceejayoz 5y ago> If we're going to use technology to eliminate infectious disease (and to increase food production) then an absolute necessity will be for humans to control their population growth by other means, perhaps legal (as with the China one-child policy, etc.). This is a solved problem already. https://www.bbc.com/news/health-53409521 https://www.bbc.com/news/health-53409521 > Falling fertility rates mean nearly every country could have shrinking populations by the end of the century. And 23 nations - including Spain and Japan - are expected to see their populations halve by 2100. > It has nothing to do with sperm counts or the usual things that come to mind when discussing fertility. Instead it is being driven by more women in education and work, as well as greater access to contraception, leading to women choosing to have fewer children.
- Terry_Roll 5y agohttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_people_with_the_most_children#Mothers_and_couples https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_people_with_the_most_c... Kids birthed / Couple / Last Year 69 / Valentina and Feodor Vassilyev[1] / 1765 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_people_with_the_most_children#Fathers https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_people_with_the_most_c... Kids Birthed / Father / Last Year 1,000–2,000+ / Genghis Khan / 1227
- ceejayoz 5y ago
- mavsman 5y agoSounds like a great Black Mirror plot: a guy has kids with a few different women, all of the kids dying. He eventually learns that he's part of a batch of males released into society to kill off part of the human race.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- adhdbrain 5y agoBut it won't work if all the kids die. Just the females.
- chopin 5y agoWhy?
- thatguy0900 5y agoIf the males survive then they can pair with normal females and use up their resources. Say I have 2 boys, and 2 girls, all die that's 4 people who won't have babies. But say the boys live and marry 2 girls. Now we have 2 dead, and 4 who can't reproduce, for 6 total taken out of the healthy reproducing gene pool. Every male with the gene who finds a life partner also takes a otherwise healthy fertile female out of the gene pool as well.
- superasn 5y agoLike children of men but being done for the purpose of population control. That sounds like a good/scary sci-fi story!
- pvaldes 5y agoEven better would be a plot about a machine that would kill those kids in the bud instead to force the society to spend valuable resources on them for several years. We could call it the condom's machine episode.
- abecedarius 5y ago
- jimmytucson 5y agoIf you like scary stories about stuff like this, I recommend Michael Crichton: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Crichton https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Crichton
- loudmax 5y agoThe thing is, we're already engaged in a massive ecological modification experiment that's bound to have unforeseen effects. It raises people's attention because this time it's done on purpose instead of by accident, but it's really pretty mild compared to what's already happening.
- engineer_22 5y agoNobody cries that we destroyed polio. Let's destroy this pest as well.
- krferriter 5y agoThere is a weird number of people in the replies here arguing for strange things like a fundamental right to life for individual mosquitos, against brushing teeth, in favor of preserving invasive species, in favor of the naturalistic fallacy, that diminishing the population of a particular species violates the consent of humans in the area where that species lives, etc.
- colechristensen 5y agoYes wanting to do the right thing mixed with very little domain knowledge and a only vague hint of what the right thing might be… is a dangerous combination, and very common among people advocating for “good” these days.
- Melatonic 5y agoSurely they have all ready the original article :-D
- VerminOctopus1 5y agoThe main demographic of this website are very evidently not scientists or even scientifically minded. So yeah, we get junk like this rather than substantive scientific discussion.
- satellite2 5y agoI think the demographic is very well informed and we should praise the diversity of opinions when honestly voiced. People on this website almost always discuss the central point that was raised and rarely use rhetorical fallacies. On the other hand what you are doing is very clearly an ad hominem. Partially relevant xkcd https://xkcd.com/1494/ https://xkcd.com/1494/
- mleonhard 5y agoHN's Eternal September [0] seems to have started late last year. I saw this happen to Slashdot, then Reddit, and now HN. What will be the next online forum for high-quality discussion? [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eternal_September https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eternal_September
- rkagerer 5y agoI'm disappointed this article doesn't contain a single quote from either the researchers or Oxitec (nor does the earlier article it links to). The experiment has been underway since April 2021 in the Florida Keys ... over the course of seven months, and has now almost completed monitoring the release sites. An obvious question would be "What are you monitoring?" and to explain why 7 months is sufficient to detect any ecological changes. Not for or against the research, and I understand it's a magazine article not a newspaper story, but this seems like more of a PR piece than real reporting.
- tclancy 5y agoCompletely uninformed on the topic, but what I inferred (it is strange it's never explicitly said) is they are trying to determine how well they can contain the effect of the mosquitoes to the intended area.
- teddyg1 5y agoOxitec has also been doing trials in other countries for a while dating back to 2014. https://www.oxitec.com/panama https://www.oxitec.com/panama
- water-your-self 5y agoThe gene was selected out after 3 generations. I
- Tozen 5y agoLike the effort to find non-toxic ways to kill mosquitoes and control their populations, however, definitely want any companies to be doing such to be highly regulated. Don't want to see any of these genetic experiments doing things they aren't supposed to or getting out of control.
- ed-209 5y agoThis will never backfire. Yep.
- majinuub 5y agoWhat could possibly go wrong?
- chiefalchemist 5y ago"Biotech firm announces results..." Why isn't the analysis delegated to an impartial 3rd party?
- mateo1 5y agoJust self-certify everything is fine ;)
- unity1001 5y agoModify an actual creature and release it to the wild where you cannot take anything back - including the freak mutations that the new organism will receive and give due to chance. What could possibly go wrong...
- betwixthewires 5y agoYou appear to have a very limited understanding of what the article is actually about. I suggest you read the article. Surely you're aware "freak mutations" occur in nature already? The world isn't a comic book.
- unity1001 5y agoI did not comment particularly about this article. I commented on the GMO technology in general. Freak mutations also occur in nature. It does not happen as fast as how human technology modifies.
- betwixthewires 5y agoBut then would it be a freak mutation? You're not talking about a human modification, you're talking about a mutation happening in the wild.
- imtringued 5y agoAh yes, the fe-male killer virus in real life. How long until it is used on humans?
- nonrandomstring 5y ago> Results from first US trial of genetically modified mosquitoes So, were the mosquitoes guilty or not guilty?
- ZYinMD 5y agoI don't mind seeing mosquitoes disappear even if they carry no virus.
- saad_123 5y ago