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Originally published in Science Express on 29 March 2007
Science 27 April 2007:
Vol. 316. no. 5824, pp. 597 - 600
DOI: 10.1126/science. 1138595
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Reports

A Synthetic Maternal-Effect Selfish Genetic Element Drives Population Replacement in Drosophila

Chun-Hong Chen,1 Haixia Huang,1 Catherine M. Ward,1 Jessica T. Su,1 Lorian V. Schaeffer,1 Ming Guo,2 Bruce A. Hay1*

One proposed strategy for controlling the transmission of insect-borne pathogens uses a drive mechanism to ensure the rapid spread of transgenes conferring disease refractoriness throughout wild populations. Here, we report the creation of maternal-effect selfish genetic elements in Drosophila that drive population replacement and are resistant to recombination-mediated dissociation of drive and disease refractoriness functions. These selfish elements use microRNA-mediated silencing of a maternally expressed gene essential for embryogenesis, which is coupled with early zygotic expression of a rescuing transgene.

1 Division of Biology, Mail Code 156-29, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA 91125, USA.
2 Departments of Neurology and Pharmacology, Brain Research Institute, David Geffen School of Medicine, University of California, Los Angeles, Los Angeles, CA 90095, USA.

* To whom correspondence should be addressed. E-mail: haybruce{at}caltech.edu

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