Dissertation Research: Fitness Consequences of Resistance to Parasitism in a Drosophila-Parasitoid System

寄生虫对动植物种群造成巨大的危害。许多生物体已进化出对寄生虫的部分抗性（免疫力）。然而，人们对维持这种免疫的生理代价和进化动力学知之甚少。本项目将探讨果蝇（Drosophila melanogaster）在维持对寄生蜂（Asobara tabida）的部分免疫力方面所经历的代价。这项研究将测量在寄生虫中存活下来的苍蝇和未被寄生虫寄生的苍蝇的适应成本。这是研究免疫的理想系统，因为有大量关于果蝇遗传和发育的先验信息。此外，黄蜂寄生虫经常用于有害昆虫的生物防治计划；了解这些防御黄蜂寄生虫的本质可能使农业科学家能够“设计”寄生虫，使其更好地逃避宿主的免疫系统。

Huey9801688Parasites cause tremendous damage to plant and animal populations. Many organisms have evolved partial resistance (immunity) to parasites. However, little is known of the physiological costs and evolutionary dynamics of maintaining such immunity. This project will explore the costs that the fruit fly (Drosophila melanogaster) experiences in maintaining partial immunity against the parasitic wasp (Asobara tabida). The research will measure fitness costs of flies that survive the parasite versus those that were unparasitized.This is an ideal system for studying immunity because of the wealth of prior information on the genetics and development of fruit flies. Moreover, wasp parasites are often used in biocontrol programs for noxious insects; and understanding the nature of those defenses against wasp parasites may enable agricultural scientists to "engineer" parasites that better evade host immune systems.