🧵 why is parasitic wasp so specific

Anonymous at Tue, 28 May 2024 06:10:40 UTC No. 16197172

why did evolution do it? if a parasitic wasp was able to convert humans biomass, it would be very effective since humans are abundant, but it cannot do it, it works only on a butterfly/moth

>parasitic wasp lays an egg on either a butterfly larva (daytime butterflies) or a moth larva (night butterflies) both types of butterflies are actually closely related altough their major differences in their appearance

>parasitic wasp releases a polyDNA virus while laying the egg, this virus is carried by all parasitic wasps and does not harm wasp herself, virus is carried only by parasitic wasps and not by non-parasitic wasps

>polyDNA virus shuts down moth or butterfly larva immune system, now the wasp egg is not attacked by butterfly-eater-cell which is a white cell that looks like an amoeba and which purpose is to eat any microscopic foreign object entering a caterpillar from the outside because these cells become dormant from then on, once they have been attacked by polyDNA virus

>wasp larva, or larvae in some species which produce several of them all in one caterpillar, are now free to reign inside the caterpillar because immune system is not bothering them, eventually fully grown butterfly caterpillar spins a cocoon on herself but a butterfly wont emerge from there, instead 1-10 fully grown wasps will emerge, either male or female wasps

now imagine if the same could happen to human? this would make a wasp pretty quickly a huge success

human skin seem like easy enough for enermging wasp to break if a wasp was growing underneat human skin, but this would require wasp virus to shutdown human immune system..