Similar to our observations for fertile nematodes, sterile lin-7 (e1449) (P < 0.0001), lin-7 (e1413) (P < 0.0001) and lin-7 (n106) (P = 0.0013, Fig. 2C) mutants also exhibited enhanced survival during infection compared with sterile wild-type nematodes. This evidence concerns the gene LIN7A and infection.