Phage WO Diversity and Evolutionary Dynamics Associated With Wolbachia-infected Crickets

Phage WO is the only bacteriophage known to infect Wolbachia, and it could provide benefits to its host or arthropods. In order to investigate the diversity and evolutionary dynamics of phage WO, we screened for the presence of phage WO in Wolbachia-infected cricket species from China for the first time. Among 21 cricket species infected with Wolbachia, 20 species harbored phage WO. This is the phage WOgene sequence in different crickets.