MBS Seminar - The function and evolution of beneficial viruses of parasitoid wasps

Title: The function and evolution of beneficial viruses of parasitoid wasps

Speaker: Dr Gaelen Burke, University of Georgia

Abstract: Parasitoid wasps maintain a parasitic lifestyle by laying their eggs into other arthropods, where their progeny feed upon and ultimately kill their hosts. These wasps are often an important player in biological control of pest insects. In the lethal interactions between parasitoids and hosts, arms race dynamics have led to the evolution of multiple strategies on the part of parasitoids to overcome host defenses. One of these strategies is partnership with viruses that are injected into hosts along with parasitoid eggs, where the viruses interfere with host defenses to create an environment conducive for optimal survival and growth of wasp offspring. In some cases, viruses have permanently integrated into the wasp genome, forming Domesticated Endogenous Viruses that are defective in replication outside of wasps but are able to infect host cells and transcribe virulence genes critical for wasp survival. In other cases, viruses are maintained as true symbionts that are vectored by wasps and function as pathogens in hosts. This talk will compare and contrast several different parasitoid wasp-host systems in terms of virus and wasp genomic architecture and virus function in wasps and hosts. Strengths and weaknesses for potential applications in biological control will also be discussed. 

Bio: Dr. Gaelen Burke grew up in Australia and was an undergraduate at the University of Queensland majoring in Microbiology and Genetics. She worked with Dr. Scott O’Neill as an undergraduate researcher on Wolbachia reproductive symbionts of fruit flies. After graduating she moved to the University of Arizona to earn her PhD in Ecology and Evolutionary biology, working with Dr. Nancy Moran on pea aphids and the role of intracellular symbionts in mediating the effects of heat stress. She worked with Dr. Michael Strand at the University of Georgia as a postdoctoral associate for 3 years, working on beneficial viruses associated with parasitoid wasps. In 2014 she started her own research group in the Department of Entomology and has since continued to work on the function and evolution of beneficial insect-microbe interactions.