Oral Bacterial Infection and Shedding in Drosophila melanogaster.

ABSTRACT: The fruit fly Drosophila melanogaster is one of the best developed model systems of infection and innate immunity. While most work has focused on systemic infections, there has been a recent increase of interest in the mechanisms of gut immunocompetence to pathogens, which require methods to orally infect flies. Here we present a protocol to orally expose individual flies to an opportunistic bacterial pathogen (Pseudomonas aeruginosa) and a natural bacterial pathogen of D. melanogaster (Pseudomonas entomophila). The goal of this protocol is to provide a robust method to expose male and female flies to these pathogens. We provide representative results showing survival phenotypes, microbe loads, and bacterial shedding, which is relevant for the study of heterogeneity in pathogen transmissio

SUBMITTER: Siva-Jothy JA 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6101445 | biostudies-literature | 2018 May

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature