Michael B. Bonsall

Gene drives are a promising technology to control disease vectors, such as mosquitoes. However, as these interventions aim to modify and/or control the population of disease vectors, a full understanding of how gene drives interact with the ecology of the target species is essential. In this study, we explore how larval competition determines gene drive performance. We first extend an agent-based model of the larval behaviour of Aedes aegypti mosquitoes to obtain detailed predictions for gene drive designs under realistic larval competition. Using Bayesian optimisation techniques, we explore the performance of different gene drive designs and find the Pareto frontier of optimal underdominant drives with different release thresholds. To understand what determines the structure of the Pareto frontier, we conduct both local and global sensitivity analyses to assess the role different parameters play in determining gene drive performance. We find that ecological parameters, which determine the behaviour of the organism, dominate over genetic parameters for much of the parameter space, although genetic parameters play an important role at the frontier. Finally, we develop stochastic and deterministic surrogate models to enable efficient comparison and simulation without imposing the computational costs of agent-based approaches.

Climate change poses a major threat to marine mammal populations, many of which remain vulnerable after years of overexploitation during the 17th to 20th centuries. Extreme climate events have grown in both frequency and severity in recent decades, and this trend is projected to accelerate under continued greenhouse gas emissions. Here, we assess how this intensification affects a top marine predator at the epicentre of extreme El Niño events – the Peruvian population of Otaria byronia (South American sea lion). We first apply a Bayesian population model that best predicts observed population dynamics to reconstruct female O. byronia population trends, estimate vital rates, and evaluate the effects of environmental drivers on survival and reproduction. We then use the same model to project extirpation risk under multiple future climate scenarios reflecting anticipated increases in both the intensity and frequency of extreme El Niño events. Our reconstruction reveals that the Peruvian O. byronia population has shown considerable resilience to episodic El Niño events over the past quarter-century, likely sustained by high female survival during normal and favourable years. However, under a scenario of moderate increases in El Niño frequency and intensity, the probability of extirpation over the next 50 years is 83.4% higher than under current conditions. As disturbance regimes intensify globally, we suggest that resilience-oriented management frameworks, grounded in species-specific demographic data and environmental context, as demonstrated here, will be essential for safeguarding marine mammal populations against an increasingly volatile climate.

Insect science is a dynamic and continually evolving field, driven equally by the methods we develop, critique and use and the philosophies that guide our investigations, interpretations and applications. Advances in technologies and techniques allow us to study insects at unprecedented spatial, temporal and molecular scales, revealing deeper insights into the mechanisms by which they shape our ecosystems, society and human health. At the same time, evolving philosophical perspectives are continuously advancing how we design our experiments, consider our animals, infer new phenomena and share our findings. Together, methods, philosophies and ethics form the critical foundations of insect science from which progress across entomology ultimately arises. Sharing and reflecting on these approaches is essential for innovation in entomology to extend beyond individual laboratories and subdisciplines to benefit the wider scientific community. These interdisciplinary advances are, however, typically scattered across journals, disciplines and informal exchanges, often struggling to find a suitable home, limiting their visibility and impact. To address this need, the Royal Entomological Society has launched a new journal dedicated to methods and philosophies across insect science. Approaches in Entomology: Methods, Philosophies, and Ethics provides a dedicated forum for the dissemination, evaluation and development of innovative approaches across the full breadth of insect science with a particular emphasis on methods, philosophies and ethical dialogues.

Rather than providing ecological services alone, natural capital can shape consumer value through culture and identity. However, how these cultural values of nature generate value remains poorly understood. Building on earlier work demonstrating that wildlife icons are associated with highvalue brands, we develop a dynamic game-theoretic model linking brand competition, consumer behaviour, and prospect theory to investigate the value of wildlife icons. We show that wildlife icons function as dynamic identity assets whose value depends on the competitive environment in which brands operate. Icon investment is most valuable in competitive environments where differentiation is important, while amplification is required in risky environments where costs dominate. Once established, consumers respond strongly to their loss. Overall our findings provide a theoretical explanation for why brands continue investing in wildlife icons and establish wildlife icons as dynamic identity assets capable of generating long-term value.

Introduction: Coral reefs face unprecedented structural reorganisation following climate-induced mass mortality. While net coral loss is well-documented, the resulting spatial arrangement of surviving communities remains understudied. This study characterises the spatial organisation, functional composition, and environmental drivers of benthic communities on the western seaward reefs of Aldabra Atoll, Seychelles, using data from 2022. Methods: Using 300, high-resolution 1 m ² video-still quadrats across two depth contours (8 m and 15 m), we integrated genus-level identification with life-history strategies (LHS) and substrate stability analysis. Results: Our data revealed that the reefs were overwhelmingly dominated by stress-tolerant, massive corals, reflecting a resilient, post-disturbance state following historical thermal anomalies. However, multivariate dispersion (patchiness) significantly increased with depth highlighting the role of environmental filtering. We identified four spatial organisational “signatures” among organisms and abiotic features. Using the Variance-to-Mean Ratio (VMR), we identified a deterministic shift in spatial signatures: from shallow aggregated frameworks to deeper, fragmented nucleated patches. Statistical niche modelling confirmed that substrate stability acts as a physical bottleneck; Isopora spp. exhibited an extreme affinity for rock pavement, while Goniopora spp. dominated mobile rubble. Discussion: Our results demonstrate that post-bleaching recovery in Aldabra is partly driven by niche-driven environmental filtering rather than purely stochastic neutral drift.

Wildlife and nature icon use is a prominent feature of contemporary consumer culture, yet its relationship to measurable forms of social and economic value remains unquantified. Here, we test whether icon use is associated with brand value, operationalised using annual sales, within global brand systems. We analyse icon use across all 2,000 brands in the Forbes' Global 2000. We show a significant positive relationship between sales and icon use: brands with higher sales are systematically more likely to incorporate wildlife and nature within their brand identities. Extending the analysis to subsidiary portfolios, which typically operate in mass consumer markets, reveals taxonomic amplification. As brands move closer to consumers, icon use significantly narrows toward mammalian representations. Icon use is also structured across sectors and regions, with statistically elevated likelihood in fashion and luxury industries and among brands headquartered in Southeast Asia. These findings show that nature is systematically embedded within the identity architectures of the world's highest-value brands. This suggests that contemporary human-wildlife relationships are mediated not only through ecological contexts, but also through global economic systems. Brands function as influential actors within a twenty-first-century symbolic economy in which wildlife is systematically associated with higher-value brand systems.

Background: Interspecific mating between Aedes aegypti and Aedes albopictus , which act as vectors of a wide range of arboviruses, is predicted to have an important influence on their future distributions and disease control efforts. While interspecific insemination has been documented in a range of laboratory and field studies, rates vary between populations. It has been suggested that the outcome of mating interactions is driven by evolved variation in both the male ability to mate interspecific females and ability of females to resist interspecific males. However, there has been relatively little dissection of the behaviours that underlie interspecific insemination rates. Methods: We compared insemination rates between sympatric, allopatric, and lab-adapted strains of Ae. aegypti (Colombia, Arizona, and Liverpool, respectively) and allopatric and sympatric strains of Ae. albopictus (Montpellier and Colombia, respectively) . We then used both live observations and high-speed videography to compare intraspecific and interspecific mating interactions. Results: We found very low rates of interspecific mating across all strains used. Both behavioural observations and high-speed videography suggested that female resistance behaviours were not responsible for low interspecific mating. Interestingly, we documented male Ae. albopictus consistently aborting interspecific mating attempts. Conclusions: This study provides additional evidence for strong pre-copulatory species barriers between Ae. aegypti and Ae. albopictus and adds male avoidance as a possible mechanism to maintain these barriers. Considering female resistance, the ability of males to overcome that resistance, and male avoidance of interspecific matings together will be important for informing understanding of how we expect interspecific mating rates to vary across populations and respond to selective pressures such as mass-release strategies.

Homing gene drives can bias their inheritance above Mendelian expectations, but reported outcomes vary widely. We compiled a cross-species dataset of nearly one million scored progeny from 42 publications reporting CRISPR/Cas9 endonuclease-based gene drives in 10 model, pest, and vector species. Using multilevel meta-analytic models, we evaluate biological, cross, and transgene design factors as predictors of biased drive inheritance. Species is the strongest predictor, but most heterogeneity remains unexplained; design features each explain a modest fraction of the remaining variation, with large construct-to-construct differences pointing to the full combination of design choices rather than any single factor. Nuclease expression timing, the most common optimization target, has limited predictive value after accounting for correlated factors, and predictions do not transfer well between species. Maternal nuclease deposition has a marginal effect on drive inheritance but dramatically increases somatic phenotype rates in offspring, revealing a tissue-of-action rather than repair-outcome effect. An interactive web tool enables community analysis of this dataset, which will guide the design of more efficient gene drives for genetic vector control, invasive species management and other applications. https://sverkuijl.shinyapps.io/GeneDrive/

Zika virus (ZIKV) is a mosquito-borne orthoflavivirus primarily transmitted among humans by Aedes aegypti. Over the past two decades, it has caused significant outbreaks associated with birth defects and neurological disorders. ZIKV consists of two main genotypes: the African and Asian lineages, each exhibiting distinct biological properties. African lineage strains are transmitted more efficiently by mosquitoes, but the genetic basis for this difference has been elusive. Here, we investigate this question by comparing recent African and Asian strains using chimeric viruses with swapped genome segments. Our results show that structural genes from the African strain enhance viral internalization, while non-structural genes improve genome replication and infectious particle production in mosquito cells. In vivo mosquito transmission is most significantly influenced by structural genes, although no single viral gene alone is decisive. We also develop a stochastic model of in vivo viral dynamics that reflects the observed patterns, suggesting the key difference between African and Asian strains lies in their ability to traverse mosquito salivary glands. Our findings imply the polygenic nature of ZIKV transmissibility has hindered Asian strains from achieving the same transmission efficiency as African strains, highlighting the role of lineage-specific adaptive landscapes in ZIKV evolution and emergence.

Sex ratio meiotic drive alleles bias their transmission by impairing the viability of non-drive gametes, leading to skewed population sex ratios. Despite theoretical predictions that drive alleles should reach fixation causing population extinction, meiotic drive persists at intermediate frequencies in wild populations, though the reasons for this are unclear. Here, we investigate how novel environmental stress and genotype-specific fitness costs contribute to drive frequency. Using a suppression-free X-linked meiotic drive system in Drosophila pseudoobscura , we exposed flies to varying doses of the pesticide permethrin and measured mortality and fecundity across genotypes. We found that drive-bearing males (SR) and drive-homozygous females (SRSR) exhibited heightened mortality, both in the presence and absence of pesticide, while heterozygous (SRST) females exhibited superior fecundity. Using a mathematical model parametrized with our empirical findings, we explored the long-term population dynamics of meiotic drive under different conditions. Our model predicts that drive frequency has a concave relationship with pesticide dose and is strongly modulated by genotype-specific female fecundity. These results suggest that novel environmental stressors and drive-induced fitness effects play key roles in determining meiotic drive frequencies. Our findings improve our understanding of drive frequencies in the wild and have direct implications for drive-based pest control.