House Fly Genome Sheds Light on Human Health and Diseases

The house fly may be a pest, but it turns out this insect could provide scientists with information that could improve our everyday lives. Scientists have taken a closer look at the house fly's genome, and state that it could provide insights into pathogen immunity, pest control and decomposing waste.

"House flies are a fascinating insect for scientists in many areas, such as developmental biology, sex determination, immunity, toxicology and physiology," said Jeff Scott, the lead author of the new paper, in a news release. "The completed genome with be a phenomenal tool for researchers in all of these fields and will facilitate rapid advancements."

In this case, the scientists examined and sequenced the 691 Mb genome. In all, they sequences the genomes of six female houseflies and compared it to the 123 Mb Drosophila melanogaster genome. This allowed them to see which genes were unique to the house fly and were candidates for future study.

This genome in particular highlights detoxification and immune system genes that are unique to the insect. Because the house fly is involved in human processes, sequencing the genome has implications for human health and identifies the genes that allow flies to live in toxic environments.

In fact, the scientists found that the fly had many more immune genes that were of a higher diversity than those found in the Drosophila genome. Understanding how this fly is immune to the human diseases that it carries could also help scientists create vaccinations and treatments for these diseases for humans.

The findings could help improve healthcare for humans in the future. That said, further study is still needed, though this does represent a significant step forward when it comes to understanding the unique genes present in the house fly.

The findings are published in the journal Genome Biology.