Department of Entomology, University of Manitoba, Winnipeg, MB, Canada.
Insect Mol Biol. 2012 Aug;21(4):446-55. doi: 10.1111/j.1365-2583.2012.01150.x. Epub 2012 Jun 12.
Deformed wing virus (DWV) is a serious pathogen of the honey bee, Apis mellifera L., vectored by the parasitic mite Varroa destructor. The virus is associated with wing deformity in symptomatic bees, and premature death and reduced colony performance in asymptomatic bees. In the present study we reduced DWV infection by feeding both first instar larvae and adult A. mellifera with a double-stranded (ds) RNA construct, DWV-dsRNA, which is specific to DWV in DWV-inoculated bees, by mixing it with their food. We showed that feeding DWV to larvae causes wing deformity in adult bees in the absence of varroa mites and decreases survival rates of adult bees relative to bees not fed DWV. Feeding larvae with DWV-dsRNA in advance of inoculation with virus reduced the DWV viral level and reduced wing deformity relative to larvae fed DWV or DWV with green fluorescent protein-dsRNA (probably a result of RNA silencing), but did not affect survival to the adult stage. Feeding DWV-dsRNA did not affect larval survival rates, which suggests that dsRNA is non-toxic to larvae. Feeding adult workers with DWV-dsRNA in advance of inoculation with virus increased their longevity and reduced DWV concentration relative to controls.
变形翅膀病毒（DWV）是一种严重的蜜蜂病原体，由寄生螨瓦螨传播。该病毒与有症状蜜蜂的翅膀畸形有关，并与无症状蜜蜂的过早死亡和蜂群性能下降有关。在本研究中，我们通过喂食第一龄幼虫和成年蜜蜂混合有双链 RNA 构建体（DWV-dsRNA）来减少 DWV 感染，该构建体特异性针对接种 DWV 的蜜蜂中的 DWV，与它们的食物混合。我们表明，喂食 DWV 幼虫会导致没有瓦螨的成年蜜蜂出现翅膀畸形，并降低成年蜜蜂的存活率，而与未喂食 DWV 的蜜蜂相比。在接种病毒之前，用 DWV-dsRNA 预先喂食幼虫会降低 DWV 病毒水平，并减少与喂食 DWV 或 GFP-dsRNA 的幼虫相比的翅膀畸形（可能是 RNA 沉默的结果），但不会影响成虫阶段的存活。用 DWV-dsRNA 喂养幼虫不会影响幼虫的存活率，这表明 dsRNA 对幼虫没有毒性。在接种病毒之前，用 DWV-dsRNA 预先喂食成年工蜂会延长其寿命，并降低与对照相比的 DWV 浓度。
