Gene drives for the extinction of wild metapopulations

Population-suppressing gene drives may be capable of extinguishing wild populations, with proposed applications in conservation, agriculture, and public health. However, unintended and potentially disastrous consequences of release of drive-engineered individuals are extremely difficult to predict. We propose a model for the dynamics of a sex ratio-biasing drive, and using simulations, we show that failure of the suppression drive is often a natural outcome due to stochastic and spatial effects. We further demonstrate rock–paper–scissors dynamics among wild-type, drive-infected, and extinct populations that can persist for arbitrarily long times. Gene drive-mediated extinction of wild populations entails critical complications that lurk far beyond the reach of laboratory-based studies. Our findings help in addressing these challenges. •We consider the possible outcomes of release of a suppression gene drive within a metapopulation.•We formulate a simple model of population dynamics based on a sex ratio-biasing gene drive.•We show that isolated populations can lead to failure of an extinction campaign.•We show that extinction of large metapopulations can be difficult to achieve.•We demonstrate cyclic dynamics and persistence of the drive within the metapopulation.