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<p>This episode: A virus partners with a parasitoid wasp to help exploit fruit fly victims!</p> <p><span style="font-size: medium;"><a href= "http://traffic.libsyn.com/bacteriofiles/BF490.mp3">Download Episode</a></span> (7.7 MB, 11.2 minutes)<br /> <br /> <span style="font-weight: bold;">Show notes:</span><br /> Microbe of the episode: <em>Actinomadura livida</em></p> <div><strong>Takeaways</strong></div> <div>Parasitoid wasps have an interesting lifestyle: they inject their eggs into the larvae of other insects, and their young hatch and grow up by consuming the host from the inside. Some of these wasps also inject a virus along with the egg, which supports the wasp offspring by suppressing the host immune system.<br /> <br /> Most of these parasitoid helper viruses are integrated into the host wasp genome and are translated and produced as needed, but in this study, an independently replicating entomopoxvirus serves as an example of a virus-wasp mutualism. The study explores how the...