Direct transmission by injection affects competition among RNA viruses in honeybees

Disruption of vitellogenin gene function in adult honeybees by intra-abdominal injection of double-stranded RNA

BACKGROUND The ability to manipulate the genetic networks underlying the physiological and behavioural repertoires of the adult honeybee worker (Apis mellifera) is likely to deepen our understanding of issues such as learning and memory generation, ageing, and the regulatory anatomy of social systems in proximate as well as evolutionary terms. Here we assess two methods for probing gene functio...

Rates of spontaneous mutation among RNA viruses.

Simple methods are presented to estimate rates of spontaneous mutation from mutant frequencies and population parameters in RNA viruses. Published mutant frequencies yield a wide range of mutation rates per genome per replication, mainly because mutational targets have usually been small and, thus, poor samples of the mutability of the average base. Nevertheless, there is a clear central tenden...

Transmission of johnsongrass chlorotic stripe mosaic virus by embryo injection

Competition among viruses at the within- and between-host scales

Many infectious pathogens, and in particular viruses, have an extremely high rate of mutation. This can lead to rapid evolution driven by selection pressures operating at the withinand betweenhost levels, as strains compete for resources within their host while also competing to effectively transmit to new hosts. In the case of chronic viral infections, such as those caused by HIV or hepatitis ...

How Rising Competition Among Microfinance Institutions Affects Incumbent Lenders

This paper uses data from Uganda’s largest incumbent microfinance institution to analyze the impact of entry by competing lenders on client behavior. We examine the geographic placement decisions of competitors, and find that lenders of different types cluster spatially and have pushed into rural areas in recent years. We observe that increased competition induces a decline in repayment perform...