Abstract
Aedes albopictus (Diptera: Culicidae) is an invasive mosquito, native to Asia, that has expanded its range worldwide. It is considered to be a public health threat as it is a competent vector of viruses of medical importance, including dengue, chikungunya, and Zika. Despite its medical importance there is almost no information on biologically important traits of Ae. albopictus in Argentina. We studied life cycle traits, demographic parameters and analyzed the competence of this mosquito as a virus vector. In addition, we determined the prevalence of Wolbachia strains in Ae. albopictus as a first approach to investigate the potential role of this bacteria in modulating vector competence for arboviruses. We observed low hatch rates of eggs, which led to a negative growth rate. We found that Ae. albopictus individuals were infected with Wolbachia in the F1 but while standard superinfection with wAlbA and wAlbB types was found in 66.7% of the females, 16.7% of the females and 62.5% of the males were single-infected with the wAlbB strain. Finally, despite high levels of infection and dissemination, particularly for chikungunya virus, Ae. albopictus from subtropical Argentina were found to be relatively inefficient vectors for transmission of both chikungunya and dengue viruses.
Highlights
Aedes albopictus (Skuse) (Diptera: Culicidae) is an invasive mosquito native to the forests of Asia that has expanded its range worldwide[1]
This species is naturally super-infected with two Wolbachia strains, wAlbA and wAlbB24, which induce cytoplasmic incompatibility (CI), i.e. embryonic lethality in crosses between uninfected females and infected males or between males and females infected with different strains[25]
In order to determine the potential importance of Ae. albopictus in dengue (DENV) and chikungunya (CHIKV) transmission in Argentina, we studied biological features including life cycle traits, demographic parameters and vector competence
Summary
Aedes albopictus (Skuse) (Diptera: Culicidae) is an invasive mosquito native to the forests of Asia that has expanded its range worldwide[1]. It is adapted to both tropical and temperate regions[2] and to urban and peridomestic environments, where it feeds on humans and domestic animals and oviposits in a variety of natural and artificial containers[3] This mosquito is considered to be a public health threat because it is a competent vector of several viruses, including dengue,chikungunya, and Zika[4,5,6,7,8,9,10]. There is no other record of Ae. albopictus in Argentina and despite the risk it poses, there is almost no information on biological traits, such as, life cycle trait and demographic parameters This species is naturally super-infected with two Wolbachia strains, wAlbA and wAlbB24, which induce cytoplasmic incompatibility (CI), i.e. embryonic lethality in crosses between uninfected females and infected males (unidirectional CI) or between males and females infected with different strains (bidirectional CI)[25]. We determined the prevalence of Wolbachia strains in Ae. albopictus as a first approach to investigate the potential role of this bacteria in modulating vector competence for arbovirus
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