Use of a Regulatory Mechanism of Sex Determination in Pest Insect Control

Overview

Journal J Genet

Specialty Genetics

Date 2010 Sep 30

PMID 20876996

Citations 16

Authors

Tarig Dafaalla

Guoliang Fu

Luke Alphey

Affiliations

Soon will be listed here.

Abstract

The sexual development of an insect is defined through a hierarchical control of several sex determining genes. Of these genes, transformer (tra) and doublesex (dsx) are well characterized and functionally conserved, especially dsx. Both genes are regulated at the transcriptional level through sex-specific alternative splicing. Incorporation of a genetically engineered sexspecific splicing module derived from these genes in transgenic systems, such as RIDL (release of insects carrying a dominant lethal), would allow the production of male-only insects for control programmes without any physical intervention.

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