Cellular immunity in the insect Galleria mellonella against insect non-parasitic nematodes

Immunity to microbial infections is well understood; however, information regarding the immunity to parasitic multicellular organisms remains lacking. To understand innate host cellular immunity to nematodes, we compared the cellular response of the greater wax moth (Galleria mellonella) larvae agai...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Parasitology 2019-05, Vol.146 (6), p.708-715
Main Authors: Ono, Masaya, Yoshiga, Toyoshi
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Bacteria
Butterflies & moths
Cell-mediated immunity
Encapsulation
Evolution
Galleria mellonella
Hemocytes
Immunity
Inoculation
Insects
Larvae
Microorganisms
Nematodes
Parasites
Parasitic diseases
Phylogenetics
Proteins
Vertebrates
Worms
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Summary:Immunity to microbial infections is well understood; however, information regarding the immunity to parasitic multicellular organisms remains lacking. To understand innate host cellular immunity to nematodes, we compared the cellular response of the greater wax moth (Galleria mellonella) larvae against the non-parasitic, bacterial-feeding nematode Caenorhabditis elegans and pathogenic nematode Heterorhabditis bacteriophora. When intact first-instar or dauer larvae of C. elegans were injected into a G. mellonella larva, most of the nematodes were alive and not confined by the surrounding reaction by insect haemocytes (encapsulation), similarly as the pathogenic nematode, whereas most of the heat-killed nematodes of both species were severely encapsulated by 24 h after inoculation. Other non-parasitic nematodes were also not encapsulated. Surprisingly, C. elegans injected into the insect haemocoel grew and propagated in the live insect, resulting in death of the host insect. Our results suggest that C. elegans has some basic mechanisms to evade immunity of G. mellonenlla and grow in the haemocoel.
ISSN:0031-1820
1469-8161
DOI:10.1017/S003118201800210X