Can CRISPR help control locust populations to reduce the impact of plague outbreaks?

Abstract

Desert locusts (Schistocerca gregaria) have been threatening food security since time immemorial and affecting human lives by destroying agriculture. Ravaging plague outbreaks are a reality and cause massive devastation across farmlands and pastures to this present day. Locust attacks and outbreaks globally affect vast areas and millions of people resulting in billions of dollars of economic loss. Although controlling the locust population through chemical pesticides is the primary method currently used, it unfortunately has not been highly effective in managing these outbreaks. Advancements in genetic engineering using CRISPR (Clustered Regularly Interspaced Short Palindromic Repeats) and its successful experiments on arthropods provide a huge opportunity that can be extended to design similar genetic behavioral changes in locusts. CRISPR has become one of the most accurate, quick, and cost-effective techniques that could potentially be very effective in managing locust populations by editing specific genes, particularly those responsible for uncontrolled reproduction during their gregarious phase. Experiments conducted on Mosquitos (Aedes aegypti) to silence microRNA-309 (miR-309), permitting stage-specific degradation of its ability to reproduce in their blood-feeding triggered phase indicates that these interventions could also be performed successfully on desert locusts. It should be possible to achieve similar results in female locusts by targeting the miR-309~6 gene cluster, impairing their ovarian development and potentially controlling locust populations.