Parasitic Wasps Genetically Engineer Caterpillars Using Domesticated Viruses - The Atlantic

The answer is yes. Last year, Sean Schneider and James Thomas from the University of Washington found evidence of bracovirus genes in the genomes of the silk moth and the monarch butterfly. The duo described the wasps as “accidental genetic engineers,” implanting the genomes of their caterpillar victims with their own (viral) DNA. In other words, one insect was genetically modifying another with viral genes, via a sting.

“What’s kind of funny is that such a species as iconic as the monarch has been genetically modified by the parasitic wasp virus and can thus be considered as a natural GMO,” says Drezen, in an email. He, together with Salvador Herrero from the University of Valencia, has now found similar genes in a wider range of butterfly and moth species, including important pests like the beet armyworm and fall armyworm. And they’ve found that these sequences may not just be passive hitchhikers.
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Michael Strand says that the team haven’t conclusively shown that the viral genes play an active role in the moths; the data, he says, are “suggestive” but not conclusive. Herrero acknowledges this, and is trying to get more unambiguous proof. He plans to disable the transferred viral genes by editing them, to see if their caterpillar owners more readily suffer from baculovirus infections. In other words, he plans to genetically modify the moths to show that the wasps have been doing so all along.

Parasitic Wasps Genetically Engineer Caterpillars Using Domesticated Viruses - The Atlantic

See also::  Recurrent Domestication by Lepidoptera of Genes from Their Parasites Mediated by Bracoviruses