Blue Moon Butterfly Chapter Summary

The joint evolutionary histories of Wolbachia and mitochondria in Hypolimnas bolina, published by BMC Evolutionary Biology is a great example of how the interactions of two organisms can lead to evolutionary change. This research article examines the history of the parasitic relationship between the Wolbachia, an intracellular bacteria, and the Blue Moon butterfly (Hypolimnas bolina). What the article explain is how wBol1, a particular strain of the bacteria, would infect H. bolina populations on islands throughout the pacific killing of the males of the population. The females of the population would not be affected however, they acted as a carrier, infecting the males during intercourse. Luckily, some of the males of H. bolina possessed suppressor genes which prevented their deaths, allowing the population to restore its sex ratio. The bacteria’s extreme prevalence allowed for this fast evolutionary change among the host. During suppression wBol1, manages to maintain itself by creating a secondary phenotype which sterilizes the uninfected females which mate with infected males. Predictably, this lead to nearly all members of H. bolina in South East Asia and Samoa to both be infected and carry genes which suppress the death of the males. On some of the islands in which wBol1 is absent wBol2 is present. Populations infected with wBol2 become resistant to …show more content…
I have always been a fan of both genetics and parasitic relationships so it was a perfect fit for me. I also found that the evidence for evolution in this case was extremely interesting. Wolbachia had caused a species to go under extreme change in a relatively short period of time evolving immunity to this infection. Evidence of this study could also support the idea that this bacteria is guiding H. bolina toward the creation of a new sub-species as it selectively chooses which butterflies have the capability to breed with one