No detectable effect of Wolbachia wMel on the prevalence and abundance of the RNA virome of Drosophila melanogaster

Abstract

Wolbachia is an endosymbiotic bacterium that can block viral infections in arthropods, generating interest in its potential to control the spread of mosquito-borne disease. Drosophila melanogaster is model organism for Wolbachia infection, and the wMel strain of Wolbachia can improve host survival following viral infection. However, it is unclear whether wMel induces anti-viral blocking against the broader native virome of D. melanogaster, or whether the major effect of Wolbachia is a reduction in viral abundance rather than viral clearance. We examined the effect of Wolbachia on viral abundance by comparing the total transcriptome of wMel-positive and wMel-negative D. melanogaster populatio..