Several signaling pathways, including the JAK/STAT and Toll pathways, are known to activate blood cells (hemocytes) in Drosophila melanogaster larvae. They are believed to regulate the immune response against infections by parasitoid wasps, such as Leptopilina boulardi, but how these pathways control the hemocytes is not well understood. Here, we discuss the recent discovery that both muscles a...

Cotesia congregata is a parasitoid wasp that injects its eggs in the host caterpillar Manduca sexta. In this host-parasite interaction, successful parasitism is ensured by a third partner: a bracovirus. The relationship between parasitic wasps and bracoviruses constitutes one of the few known mutualisms between viruses and eukaryotes. The C. congregata bracovirus (CcBV) is injected at the same ...

We studied the sex determination in Diachasmimorpha longicaudata, a parasitoid braconid wasp widely used as biological control agent of fruit pest tephritid flies. We tested the complementary sex determination hypothesis (CSD) known in at least 60 species of Hymenoptera. According to CSD, male or female development depends on the allelic composition of one sex locus (single-locus CSD) or multip...

The parasitoid Prorops nasutaWaterston (Hymenoptera: Bethylidae) is a wasp of the coffee berry borer, Hypothenemus hampei (Ferrari) (Coleoptera: Curculionidae). In this study, the attractiveness of different volatiles to P. nasuta was studied in the laboratory using a Y-tube olfactometer. Female wasps were attracted to coffee berry borer-infested coffee berries but not to uninfested or artiÞcia...

There are many examples of apparent manipulation of host phenotype by parasites, yet few examples of hypermanipulation-where a phenotype-manipulating parasite is itself manipulated by a parasite. Moreover, few studies confirm manipulation is occurring by quantifying whether the host's changed phenotype increases parasite fitness. Here we describe a novel case of hypermanipulation, in which the ...

The vast majority of multicellular organisms coexist with bacterial symbionts that may play various roles during their life cycle. Parasitoid wasp Megaphragma amalphitanum (Hymenoptera: Trichogrammatidae) belongs to the smallest known insects whose size is comparable with some bacteria. Using 16S rRNA gene sequencing and Whole Genome Sequencing (WGS), we described microbiota diversity for this ...

Selfish interests usually preclude resource sharing, but under some conditions collective actions enhance per capita gains. Such Allee effects underlay early explanations of social evolution but current understanding focusses on kin selection (inclusive fitness). We find an Allee effect that explains unusual quasisociality (cooperative brood care) among parasitoid wasps without invoking or prec...

Immune defense is energetically costly, and thus an effective response requires metabolic adaptation of the organism to reallocate energy from storage, growth, and development towards the immune system. We employ the natural infection of Drosophila with a parasitoid wasp to study energy regulation during immune response. To combat the invasion, the host must produce specialized immune cells (la...

Fopius ceratitivorus Wharton is the most recently imported parasitoid for biological control of tephritid fruit flies in Hawaii. In this paper we summarize current progress on studies of this parasitoid under quarantine conditions in Hawaii. Tests on its potential target host range reveal that F. ceratitivorus attacks and completes its development only in the Mediterranean fruit fly, Ceratitis ...

Ganaspis xanthopoda is a solitary larval parasitoid wasp of the fruit fly Drosophila melanogaster. The life cycle of Ganaspis xanthopoda in the wild-type and developmental mutant ecdysoneless strains of Drosophila melanogaster is described. The female infects a second-instar host larva. The parasitoid embryo hatches into a mobile first-instar (L1) larva. The L1 parasitoid has fleshy appendages ...