Immune Cell Production Is Targeted by Parasitoid Wasp Virulence in a Drosophila-Parasitoid Wasp Interaction.

ABSTRACT: The interactions between Drosophila melanogaster and the parasitoid wasps that infect Drosophila species provide an important model for understanding host-parasite relationships. Following parasitoid infection, D. melanogaster larvae mount a response in which immune cells (hemocytes) form a capsule around the wasp egg, which then melanizes, leading to death of the parasitoid. Previous studies have found that host hemocyte load; the number of hemocytes available for the encapsulation response; and the production of lamellocytes, an infection induced hemocyte type, are major determinants of host resistance. Parasitoids have evolved various virulence mechanisms to overcome the immune response of the D. melanogaster host, including both active immune suppression by

SUBMITTER: Trainor JE 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7826891 | biostudies-literature | 2021 Jan

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature