Note that it is far from clear [1] is what needs to be done. [1] introduces sterility using gene drive. Sterility is effective but in a sense self-defeating, and it can only suppress, not eradicate, mosquito population.
[2] demonstrates introducing malaria immunity using gene drive. To attack malaria, it is enough to immunize mosquito against malaria, instead of eradicating mosquito. Immunity is also not self-defeating and can reach 100% fixation.
With multiple gene drivers you can drive a species to extinction - the power of CRISPR-Cas9 gene drive system is that you can make multiple different drivers easily.
Yes you can use gene drivers to create immunity in mosquitos against carrying certain diseases, but that only targets one disease at a time. Better to remove the vector rather than try to make the vector less dangerous.
This paper by George Church is a pretty good overview [1].
Thanks for the link. That article mentions a plan where A) a vector species is eliminated and B) the species is repopulated from "clean" populations that have been simultaneously been kept alive in a lab/farm. Supposedly this will eradicate the parasite and its host while (probably?) allowing the reintroduction of the host species in the future without all the nasty parasites.
I suppose if the parasite rears its head again you could try rinse & repeat or just eradicate the host species and not bother to give them another chance via repopulation from a clean source.
EDIT: This eradicate everything, followed by a reintroduction of a "clean" population certainly sounds nicer than plain eradication. I worry about how an ecosystem can gracefully handle a rapid fire extinction/reduction and reintroduction.
Even if that isn't feasible, we would behoove ourselves to think about creating a Naughty Species Bank of populations of species we want to eradicate, before we actually attack that species. I'd be worried that we cannot re-introduce the original species if (when?) we encounter an "Oops... turns out that was a bad idea..." situation.
Yes as long as we kept some of the species alive we could always choose to repopulate the environment later if it turned out some extremely unlikely catastrophic result occurred.
Personally I think the only good blood sucking mosquito is a dead one so I doubt I would want to see them back even if they didn’t kill people.
Yes, gene drive can be used for extinction. No, the article you originally linked and said "we already know what needs to be done", is not for extinction.
By we I mean humanity, not the authors of the paper. They tended to hide behind sciencese in regards the significance of their work and didn’t go too much into its importance - the English don’t like to boast in public about themselves :)
What is important is they have showed how you can achieve extinction - we have known for a while that it was possible in theory, but there has not been a practical way of achieving this. We now have a practical way doing this - basically there are no limit to the number of genes you can target with the CRISPR-Cas9 driver system. Target enough and the species goes extinct.
If this approach is implemented it will save millions of people - every day we delay means another 3000 people die.
[2] demonstrates introducing malaria immunity using gene drive. To attack malaria, it is enough to immunize mosquito against malaria, instead of eradicating mosquito. Immunity is also not self-defeating and can reach 100% fixation.
2. http://www.pnas.org/content/112/49/E6736.full