19 Facts About Wolbachia

Wolbachia is a genus of intracellular bacteria that infects mainly arthropod species, including a high proportion of insects, and some nematodes.

Research on Wolbachia intensified after 1971, when Janice Yen and A Ralph Barr of UCLA discovered that Culex mosquito eggs were killed by a cytoplasmic incompatibility when the sperm of Wolbachia-infected males fertilized infection-free eggs.

The genus Wolbachia is of considerable interest today due to its ubiquitous distribution, its many different evolutionary interactions, and its potential use as a biocontrol agent.

Phylogenetic studies have shown that Wolbachia persica was closely related to species in the genus Francisella and that Wolbachia melophagi was closely related to species in the genus Bartonella, leading to a transfer of these species to these respective genera.

Furthermore, unlike true Wolbachia, which needs a host cell to multiply, F persica and B melophagi can be cultured on agar plates.

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Wolbachia species are ubiquitous in mature eggs, but not mature sperm.

Wolbachia bacteria maximize their spread by significantly altering the reproductive capabilities of their hosts, with four different phenotypes:.

For example, populations of the pill woodlouse, Armadillidium vulgare which are exposed to the feminizing effects of Wolbachia, have been known to lose their female-determining chromosome.

Wolbachia infection has been linked to viral resistance in Drosophila melanogaster, Drosophila simulans, and mosquito species.

In leafminers of the species Phyllonorycter blancardella, Wolbachia bacteria help their hosts produce green islands on yellowing tree leaves, that is, small areas of leaf remaining fresh, allowing the hosts to continue feeding while growing to their adult forms.

In Drosophila melanogaster, Wolbachia is found to mediate iron metabolism under nutritional stress and in Cimex lectularius, the Wolbachia strain cCle helps the host to synthesize B vitamins.

Some Wolbachia strains have increased their prevalence by increasing their hosts' fecundity.

Wolbachia strains captured from 1988 in southern California still induce a fecundity deficit, but nowadays the fecundity deficit is replaced with a fecundity advantage such that infected Drosophila simulans produces more offspring than the uninfected ones.

Wolbachia often manipulates host reproduction and life-history in a way that favours its own propagation.

Additionally, Wolbachia has been seen to decrease the lifespan of Aedes aegypti, carriers of mosquito-borne diseases, and it decreases their efficacy of pathogen transmission because older mosquitoes are more likely to have become carriers of one of those diseases.

Small non-coding RNAs WsnRNA-46 and WsnRNA-59 in Wolbachia were detected in Aedes aegypti mosquitoes and Drosophila melanogaster.

Naturally existing strains of Wolbachia have been shown to be a route for vector control strategies because of their presence in arthropod populations, such as mosquitoes.

Wolbachia has been identified to inhibit replication of chikungunya virus in A aegypti.

Wolbachia can affect the activity of aromatase in developing fish embryos.