Partitiviruses are segmented, multipartite dsRNA viruses that until recently were only known to infect fungi, plants, and protozoans. Metagenomic surveys have revealed that partitivirus-like sequences are also commonly associated with arthropods. One arthropod-associated partitivirus, galbut virus, is extraordinarily common in wild populations of Drosophila melanogaster fruit flies. To begin to understand the processes that underlie this virus's high global prevalence, we established colonies of wild-caught infected flies. Infection remained at stably high levels over three years, with between 63-100% of individual flies infected. Galbut virus infects fly cells and replicates in tissues throughout infected adults, including reproductive tissues and the gut epithelium. We detected no evidence of horizontal transmission via ingestion but vertical transmission from either infected females or infected males was ~100% efficient. Vertical transmission of a related partitivirus, verdadero virus, that we discovered in a laboratory colony of Aedes aegypti mosquitoes was similarly efficient. This suggests that efficient biparental vertical transmission may be a feature of at least a subset of insect-infecting partitiviruses. To study the impact of galbut virus infection free from the confounding effect of other viruses, we generated an inbred line of flies with galbut virus as the only detectable virus infection. We were able to transmit infection experimentally via microinjection of homogenate from these galbut-only flies. This sets the stage for experiments to understand the biological impact and possible utility of partitiviruses infecting important model organisms and disease vectors.

中文翻译：

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感染果蝇和埃及伊蚊的部分病毒表现出有效的双亲垂直传播

Partitiviruses是分段的多部分dsRNA病毒，直到最近才知道它能感染真菌，植物和原生动物。元基因组学调查显示，类似partitivirus的序列也通常与节肢动物有关。一种与节肢动物有关的partitivirus galbut病毒在果蝇果蝇的野生种群中格外常见果蝇。为了开始了解构成该病毒高全球流行率的过程，我们建立了野生捕获的感染果蝇的菌落。在过去三年中，感染保持稳定的高水平，其中63-100％的个体蝇受到感染。Galbut病毒会感染蝇细胞，并在整个受感染的成年人体内的组织中复制，包括生殖组织和肠道上皮。我们没有发现通过摄入引起水平传播的证据，但是感染女性或感染男性的垂直传播效率约为100％。我们在埃及伊蚊的实验室菌落中发现的相关Partitivirus，verdadero病毒的垂直传播蚊子同样有效。这表明有效的双亲垂直传播可能是感染昆虫的部分病毒的至少一个子集的特征。为了研究不受其他病毒混杂影响的galbut病毒感染的影响，我们生成了以galbut病毒为唯一可检测到的病毒感染的自交蝇系。我们能够通过显微注射来自这些只含半乳糖的果蝇的匀浆，以实验方式传播感染。这就为进行实验奠定了基础，以了解感染重要模型生物和疾病载体的partitiviruses的生物学影响和可能的效用。