Abstract
Land cover and land use change (LCLUC) acts as a catalyst for spillover of arthropod-borne pathogens into novel hosts by shifting host and vector diversity, abundance, and distribution, ultimately reshaping host–vector interactions. Identification of bloodmeals from wild-caught mosquitoes provides insight into host utilization of particular species in particular land cover types, and hence their potential role in pathogen maintenance and spillover. Here, we collected 134 blood-engorged mosquitoes comprising 10 taxa across 9 land cover types in Sarawak, Malaysian Borneo, a region experiencing intense LCLUC and concomitant spillover of arthropod-borne pathogens. Host sources of blood were successfully identified for 116 (87%) mosquitoes using cytochrome oxidase subunit I (COI) barcoding. A diverse range of hosts were identified, including reptiles, amphibians, birds, and mammals. Sixteen engorged Aedes albopictus, a major vector of dengue virus, were collected from seven land cover types and found to feed exclusively on humans (73%) and boar (27%). Culex tritaeniohynchus (n = 2), Cx. gelidus (n = 3), and Cx. quiquefasciatus (n = 3), vectors of Japanese encephalitis virus, fed on humans and pigs in the rural built-up land cover, creating potential transmission networks between these species. Our data support the use of COI barcoding to characterize mosquito–host networks in a biodiversity hotspot.
Highlights
Mosquito-borne viruses such as dengue virus (DENV), yellow fever virus (YFV), Zika virus (ZIKV), and chikungunya virus (CHIKV) have gained notoriety for causing explosive, global pandemics sustained in transmission between humans and the urban-living mosquitoes Ae. aegypti and Ae. albopictus [1,2,3]
Spectral and spatial features derived from the 8 multispectral Operational Land Imager (OLI) bands as well as topographic features derived from the Shuttle Radar Topography Mission (SRTM) Digital Elevation Model (DEM) [36,37] were combined in a 577-band layer stack
To visualize host and vector networks, associations between vectors and hosts detected from bloodmeal identification, alluvial plots were created for each land cover type from which >5 bloodmeals were identified
Summary
Mosquito-borne viruses such as dengue virus (DENV), yellow fever virus (YFV), Zika virus (ZIKV), and chikungunya virus (CHIKV) have gained notoriety for causing explosive, global pandemics sustained in transmission between humans and the urban-living mosquitoes Ae. aegypti and Ae. albopictus [1,2,3]. Spectral and spatial features derived from the 8 multispectral OLI bands as well as topographic features derived from the Shuttle Radar Topography Mission (SRTM) Digital Elevation Model (DEM) [36,37] were combined in a 577-band layer stack This layer stack was classified using Random Forest and 600 Google Earth-based training/testing sites into eleven major land cover types: Urban built-up land, rural built-up land, agricultural land, primary forest, secondary forest, swamp forest, mangrove forest, open-canopy ground vegetation, barren land, and water. At the completion of all projects, a total of nine land cover types were sampled; barren land, urban built-up land, rural built-up land, open-canopy ground vegetation, non-oil palm agricultural land, oil palm plantation, swamp forest, secondary forest, and primary forest; all are described in detail in Table S1 and Figure S1.
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