Research

Host Range Specificity in Baculoviruses

Baculoviruses are natural pathogens of insect pests that have an impact in our health, economy, and environment.  Insects comprise over 80% of animal species and destroy almost 30% of crops worldwide and vector a number of diseases that affect humans and domestic animals. 

There are significant efforts underway to use baculoviruses to control insect pests that affect human health like mosquitoes that vector a number of diseases such as arboviral encephalitis (Eastern equine, Japanese, La Crosse, St. Louis,West Nile Virus), dengue fever, yellow fever, Rift Valley fever, and malaria.  Also, baculoviruses have been used as biopesticides in Brazil, South Pacific, and the U.S.A. to protect our crops and forests.

The study of baculovirus host range is important to safely extend the uses of baculoviruses as biopesticides and gene expression vectors. We study baculovirus gene transcription and DNA replication factors that have been implicated in broadening the host species the virus can infect and in which they replicate. The virus can enter semi- and non-permissive hosts, but a block in the infection process usually occurs during the late and very late phases of viral transcription.  Thus, a successful infection in alternative hosts may depend on the late/very late gene-specific or replication factors that differentially interact with host factors expressed in each cell line or organism. The knowledge of the functions of these late/very late transcription and replication genes in the processes of transcription, replication, or host range is limited.  The long-term goal is to define determinants for host range, their role in host specificity, and parameters necessary to manipulate the host range of the viruses to make them more efficient bioinseticides.