Abstract
BackgroundThe Wolbachia incompatible insect technique (IIT) shows promise as a method for eliminating populations of invasive mosquitoes such as Aedes aegypti (Linnaeus) (Diptera: Culicidae) and reducing the incidence of vector-borne diseases such as dengue, chikungunya and Zika. Successful implementation of this biological control strategy relies on high-fidelity separation of male from female insects in mass production systems for inundative release into landscapes. Processes for sex-separating mosquitoes are typically error-prone and laborious, and IIT programmes run the risk of releasing Wolbachia-infected females and replacing wild mosquito populations.ResultsWe introduce a simple Markov population process model for studying mosquito populations subjected to a Wolbachia-IIT programme which exhibit an unstable equilibrium threshold. The model is used to study, in silico, scenarios that are likely to yield a successful elimination result. Our results suggest that elimination is best achieved by releasing males at rates that adapt to the ever-decreasing wild population, thus reducing the risk of releasing Wolbachia-infected females while reducing costs.ConclusionsWhile very high-fidelity sex separation is required to avoid establishment, release programmes tend to be robust to the release of a small number of Wolbachia-infected females. These findings will inform and enhance the next generation of Wolbachia-IIT population control strategies that are already showing great promise in field trials.
Highlights
The Wolbachia incompatible insect technique (IIT) shows promise as a method for eliminating populations of invasive mosquitoes such as Aedes aegypti (Linnaeus) (Diptera: Culicidae) and reducing the incidence of vector-borne diseases such as dengue, chikungunya and Zika
The incompatible insect technique (IIT) is closely related to sterile insect technique (SIT), but rather than releasing sterilised insects, this approach relies upon Wolbachiainfected male mosquitoes that are incapable of producing viable offspring after mating with a wild-type female [7]
We ran a total of 114,000 individual simulations each taking an average of 17 min to run on a single CPU core, with 90,000 of those simulations for importance sampling estimates of establishment and elimination probabilities
Summary
The Wolbachia incompatible insect technique (IIT) shows promise as a method for eliminating populations of invasive mosquitoes such as Aedes aegypti (Linnaeus) (Diptera: Culicidae) and reducing the incidence of vector-borne diseases such as dengue, chikungunya and Zika Successful implementation of this biological control strategy relies on high-fidelity separation of male from female insects in mass production systems for inundative release into landscapes. The incompatible insect technique (IIT) is closely related to SIT, but rather than releasing sterilised insects, this approach relies upon Wolbachiainfected male mosquitoes that are incapable of producing viable offspring after mating with a wild-type female [7] Endosymbiotic bacteria, such as Wolbachia, may exhibit a biological mechanism known as cytoplasmic incompatibility (CI) [7]. While other methods of sterilisation, such as radiation and genetic modification, impose a large fitness burden [8] or suffer from complicated regulatory pathways [9], the use of a Wolbachia IIT approach offers a promising solution for controlling insect populations without these limitations [10]
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