Last month, Yan et al. published their work using CRISPR/Cas9 in ants in the journal, Cell. This research was published alongside Trible et al., which was discussed here previously, based on a preprint version available at BioR𝛘iv. Both studies analyzed […]
Orco
Germline Modification of Ants
Trible et al 2017 reported in BioRχiv the first study of genetically modified ants using genome editing. Clonal raider ants (Ooceraea biroi) are potential genetic models to study social complexity and social evolution. It is known that social insects such as […]
Orco Knockout Mutants of Locusta migratoria
A recent report by Li et al. demonstrates that by using a state-of-the-art CRISPR/Cas9 genome editing, it is now possible to study the function of Orco in the locust, Locusta migratoria . The gene odorant receptor co-receptor (Orco) encodes […]
Gene Editing Spodoptera
Three papers recently described successful CRISPR/Cas9 mutagenesis in two species of Spodoptera. Spodoptera litura and S. littoralis. Bi et al (2016) use Cas9 to create somatic mutations in S. litura in developmental gene abdominal-A, abd-A, and analyzed the resulting larvae […]
Gene Editing in Ostrinia furnacalis
Yang et al (2015) describe their successful knockout of the orco coreceptor using TALENs in the Asian corn borer, Ostrinia furnacalis. Moving genetic technologies into new insect systems requires the solution to a number of problems including the development of […]
Interstadial gene silencing in Rhodnius prolixus
Franco et al. (2015) have a manuscript that has recently been accepted to Insect Biochemistry and Molecular Biology in which they use RNAi to probe the function of the odorant receptor co-receptor (Orco) in Rhodnius prolixus. The biological findings of the […]