Correlated responses in basal immune function in response to selection for fast development in Drosophila melanogaster.

Often, immunity is invoked in the context of infection, disease and injury. However, an ever alert and robust immune system is essential for maintaining good health, but resource investment into immunity needs to be traded off against allocation to other functions. In this study, we study the consequences of such a trade-off with growth by ascertaining various components of baseline innate immunity in two types of Drosophila melanogaster populations selected for fast development, in combination with either a long effective lifespan (FLJs) or a short effective lifespan (FEJs).

Heightened immune surveillance in populations selected for faster development and extended longevity.

Maximization of life-history traits is under constraints due to both, limitations of resource acquisition and the restricted pathways of resource allocation. has served as an excellent model organism to not only unravel various trade-offs among life history traits but also numerous aspects of host immune response. larvae are semi-aquatic that live, feed and excrete inside the food source-often over-ripe fruits and vegetables that are rich in both commensal and pathogenic microbiota that can impact the larval survival.

Wing patterning in faster developing Drosophila is associated with high ecdysone titer and wingless expression.

'Developmental robustness' is the ability of biological systems to maintain a stable phenotype despite genetic, environmental or physiological perturbations. In holometabolous insects, accurate patterning and development is guaranteed by alignment of final gene expression patterns in tissues at specific developmental stage such as molting and pupariation, irrespective of individual rate of development. In the present study, we used faster developing Drosophila melanogaster populations that show reduction of ~22% in egg to adult development time.