We identified a 9332-nucleotide-long novel picornaviral genome sequence in the transcriptome of an agriculturally important parasitoid wasp (Pachycrepoideus vindemmiae (Rondani, 1875)). The genome of the novel virus, Rondani’s wasp virus 1 (RoWV-1), contains two long open reading frames encoding a nonstructural and a structural protein, respectively, and is 3’-polyadenylated. Phylogenetic analyses firmly place RoWV-1 into the dicistrovirid genus Cripavirus. We detected RoWV-1 in various tissues and life stages of the parasitoid wasp, with the highest virus load measured in the larval digestive tract. We demonstrate that RoWV-1 is transmitted horizontally from infected to uninfected wasps but not vertically to wasp offspring. Comparison of several important biological parameters between the infected and uninfected wasps indicates that RoWV-1 does not have obvious detrimental effects on wasps. We further demonstrate that RoWV-1 also infects Drosophila melanogaster (Meigen, 1830), the hosts of the pupal ectoparasitoid wasps, and thereby increases its pupal developmental duration and fecundity, but decreases the eclosion rate. Together, these results suggest that RoWV-1 may have a potential benefit to the wasp by increasing not only the number of potential wasp hosts but also the developmental time of the hosts to ensure proper development of wasp offspring.

我们在农业上重要的寄生蜂 ( Pachycrepoideus vindemmiae (Rondani, 1875)) 的转录组中鉴定了一个 9332 个核苷酸长的新型小核糖核酸病毒基因组序列。新型病毒 Rondani 黄蜂病毒 1 (RoWV-1) 的基因组包含两个分别编码非结构蛋白和结构蛋白的长开放阅读框，并且是 3'-聚腺苷酸化的。系统发育分析将 RoWV-1 牢牢地置于双顺式病毒属Cripavirus. 我们在寄生蜂的各个组织和生命阶段检测到 RoWV-1，在幼虫消化道中测得的病毒载量最高。我们证明 RoWV-1 从受感染的黄蜂水平传播到未感染的黄蜂，但不会垂直传播到黄蜂后代。感染和未感染黄蜂的几个重要生物学参数的比较表明，RoWV-1 对黄蜂没有明显的不利影响。我们进一步证明 RoWV-1 也感染黑腹果蝇(Meigen, 1830) 是蛹外寄生蜂的寄主，从而增加了其蛹的发育持续时间和繁殖力，但降低了羽化率。总之，这些结果表明，RoWV-1 可能对黄蜂有潜在的好处，不仅可以增加潜在黄蜂宿主的数量，还可以增加宿主的发育时间，以确保黄蜂后代的正常发育。