How many species are infected with Wolbachia? – a statistical analysis of current data

By Kirsten Hilgenboecker, Peter Hammerstein, P. Schlattmann, A. Telschow, John H. Werren. FEMS Microbiology Letters, 2008

1,248 citations recorded by the source corpus.

Wolbachia are intracellular bacteria found in many species of arthropods and nematodes. They manipulate the reproduction of their arthropod hosts in various ways, may play a role in host speciation and have potential applications in biological pest control. Estimates suggest that at least 20% of all insect species are infected with Wolbachia. These estimates result from several Wolbachia screenings in which numerous species were tested for infection; however, tests were mostly performed on only one to two individuals per species. The actual percent of species infected will depend on the distribution of infection frequencies among species. We present a meta-analysis that estimates percentage of infected species based on data on the distribution of infection levels among species. We used a beta-binomial model that describes the distribution of infection frequencies of Wolbachia, shedding light on the overall infection rate as well as on the infection frequency within species. Our main findings are that (1) the proportion of Wolbachia-infected species is estimated to be 66%, and that (2) within species the infection frequency follows a ‘most-or-few’ infection pattern in a sense that the Wolbachia infection frequency within one species is typically either very high (>90%) or very low (<10%).

Subfields: Ecology, Evolution, Behavior and Systematics, Insect Science

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/a18688c30a181f7c837b7d7d5c82f7b33b3a570f

How researchers see this paper

The researchers whose trusted networks rank it highest, strongest advocate first. Every researcher gets a different order.

In Ecology, Evolution, Behavior and Systematics

In Insect Science

Citations in the corpus

Mitochondrial DNA as a marker of molecular diversity: a reappraisal (2009, background): “…most common inherited symbiont, the rarity of co-speciation of Wolbachia and host (Shoemaker et al. 2002) combined with the commonness of Wolbachia overall (possibly up to 65% of species: Hilgenboecker et al. 2008) indicates that infections spread and are lost from host species on a regular basis.”
Ecological genetics of invasive alien species (2011, background): “Maternally-inherited endosymbiont bacteria, such as Wolbachia (Rickettsiales), are very common in insects (Hilgenboecker et al. 2008) and impose a range of consequences on their hosts’ reproduction, including cytoplasmic incompatibility (CI), male-killing, and induced parthenogenesis (reviewed in…”
Still a Host of Hosts for Wolbachia: Analysis of Recent Data Suggests That 40% of Terrestrial Arthropod Species Are Infected (2012, positive): “Therefore, as was already pointed out by Hilgenboecker et al. [2], omission of large samples will improve estimates of Wolbachia incidence.”
A comparison of observation-level random effect and Beta-Binomial models for modelling overdispersion in Binomial data in ecology & evolution (2015, result): “…parameter that can reveal a biological cause underlying aggregation/non-independence of probabilities in the dataset (e.g., Beta-Binomial models, Hilgenboecker et al., 2008; OLRE models, Elston et al., 2001, and the size of the aggregation parameter is informative and comparable across studies…”
Nothing in Genetics Makes Sense Except in Light of Genomic Conflict (2013, background): “For example, Wolbachia is a surprisingly common endosymbiont in invertebrates, infecting about 65% of all insects (Hilgenboecker et al. 2008).”
Bacterial symbionts as mediators of ecologically important traits of insect hosts (2011, background): “Reproductive manipulators such as Wolbachia, Spiroplasma, and Arsenophonus are widespread among arthropods with an estimated 70% of all species being infected (Duron et al., 2008; Hilgenboecker et al., 2008).”
A Wolbachia symbiont in Aedes aegypti limits infection with dengue, Chikungunya, and Plasmodium. (2009, background): “Wolbachia is an intracellular inherited bacterium, predicted to naturally infect more than 60% of all insect species worldwide (Hilgenboecker et al., 2008; Jeyaprakash and Hoy, 2000) that is able to invade host populations through either the induction of a number of reproductive parasitism traits (O”
Wolbachia as a bacteriocyte-associated nutritional mutualist (2009, background): “Wolbachia represents the most prevalent endosymbiotic bacterial group, associated with over 60% of insect species (5).”
Insect Gut Bacterial Diversity Determined by Environmental Habitat, Diet, Developmental Stage, and Phylogeny of Host (2014, background): “Members of the genus Wolbachia infect many members of the Arthropoda (53, 54) and were predominant among the heritable symbionts identified.”
The Bacterial Symbiont Wolbachia Induces Resistance to RNA Viral Infections in Drosophila melanogaster (2008, background): “arthropod species [1–3]; therefore Wolbachia are one of the”