title: Immune anticipation of mating in Drosophila: Turandot M promotes immunity against sexually transmitted fungal infections.
abstract: Although it is well known that mating increases the risk of infection, we do not know how females mitigate the fitness costs of sexually transmitted infections (STIs). It has recently been shown that female fruitflies, Drosophila melanogaster, specifically upregulate two members of the Turandot family of immune and stress response genes, Turandot M and Turandot C (TotM and TotC), when they hear male courtship song. Here, we use the Gal4/UAS RNAi gene knockdown system to test whether the expression of these genes provides fitness benefits for females infected with the entomopathogenic fungus, Metarhizium robertsii under sexual transmission. As a control, we also examined the immunity conferred by Dorsal-related immunity factor (Dif), a central component of the Toll signalling pathway thought to provide immunity against fungal infections. We show that TotM, but not TotC or Dif, provides survival benefits to females following STIs, but not after direct topical infections. We also show that though the expression of TotM provides fecundity benefits for healthy females, it comes at a cost to their survival, which helps to explain why TotM is not constitutively expressed. Together, these results show that the anticipatory expression of TotM promotes specific immunity against fungal STIs and suggest that immune anticipation is more common than currently appreciated.
authors.affiliation: Department of Biology and Biochemistry, University of Bath, , Bath BA2 7SW, UK, Department of Ecology and Genetics, Animal Ecology, Evolutionary Biology Centre, Uppsala University, , Norbyvägen 18 D, Uppsala 75236, Sweden, School of Biology, Biomedical Sciences Research Complex, University of St Andrews, , St Andrews, Fife KY16 9ST, UK.
authors.forename: Weihao
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Zhong
authors.forename: Colin D
authors.initials: CD
authors.lastname: McClure
authors.forename: Cara R
authors.initials: CR
authors.lastname: Evans
authors.forename: David T
authors.initials: DT
authors.lastname: Mlynski
authors.forename: Elina
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Immonen
authors.forename: Michael G
authors.initials: MG
authors.lastname: Ritchie
authors.forename: Nicholas K
authors.initials: NK
authors.lastname: Priest
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D060467:Disease Resistance; D029721:Drosophila Proteins / Q000037:antagonists & inhibitors / Q000276:immunology* / Q000502:physiology; D004331:Drosophila melanogaster / Q000276:immunology* / Q000382:microbiology / Q000502:physiology; D005260:Female; D005298:Fertility; D005786:Gene Expression Regulation; D006360:Heat-Shock Proteins / Q000037:antagonists & inhibitors / Q000276:immunology* / Q000502:physiology; D008297:Male; D052981:Metarhizium / Q000276:immunology; D034622:RNA Interference; D012726:Sexual Behavior, Animal; D015398:Signal Transduction
chemical_list: D029721:Drosophila Proteins; D006360:Heat-Shock Proteins; C572252:TotM protein, Drosophila
keywords: Drosophila melanogaster; Metarhizium robertsii; ecological immunology; immune anticipation; innate immunity; sexually transmitted infections