Escherichia coli Infection of Drosophila

Abstract

Following septic insults, healthy insects, just like vertebrates, mount a complex immune response to contain and destroy pathogens. The failure to efficiently clear bacterial infections in immuno-compromised fly mutants leads to higher mortality rates which provide a powerful indicator for genes with important roles in innate immunity. The following protocol is designed to reproducibly inject a known amount of non-pathogenic E. coli into otherwise sterile flies and to measure the survival of flies after infection. The protocol can be easily adapted to different types of bacteria.