New self-sexing strain eliminates barriers to scalable and sustainable vector control for governments and communities in dengue-prone environments.

For more than 60 years, efforts to develop mating-based mosquito control technologies have largely failed to produce solutions that are both effective and scalable, keeping them out of reach of most governments and communities in disease-impacted regions globally. High pest suppression levels in trials have yet to fully translate into broad and effective control solutions. Two primary challenges to date-the need for complex sex-sorting to prevent female releases, and cumbersome processes for rearing and releasing male adult mosquitoes-present significant barriers for existing methods.

Insecticide resistance mediated by an exon skipping event.

Many genes increase coding capacity by alternate exon usage. The gene encoding the insect nicotinic acetylcholine receptor (nAChR) α6 subunit, target of the bio-insecticide spinosad, is one example of this and expands protein diversity via alternative splicing of mutually exclusive exons. Here, we show that spinosad resistance in the tomato leaf miner, Tuta absoluta is associated with aberrant regulation of splicing of Taα6 resulting in a novel form of insecticide resistance mediated by exon skipping.

Vitellogenin gene expression as a biomarker of endocrine disruption in the invertebrate, Mytilus edulis.

Vitellogenin levels are often used as a biomarker of endocrine disruption in fish. For invertebrates, there is a general lack of knowledge regarding endocrine regulation and, consequently, there are few direct biomarkers of endocrine disruption in such species. This study focuses on the marine mussel Mytilus edulis, which is often employed in biomonitoring studies.