TY - JOUR
T1 - Aedes albopictus host odor preference does not drive observed variation in feeding patterns across field populations
AU - Fikrig, Kara
AU - Rose, Noah
AU - Burkett-Cadena, Nathan
AU - Kamgang, Basile
AU - Leisnham, Paul T.
AU - Mangan, Jamie
AU - Ponlawat, Alongkot
AU - Rothman, Sarah E.
AU - Stenn, Tanise
AU - McBride, Carolyn S.
AU - Harrington, Laura C.
N1 - Funding Information:
This work was supported in part by cooperative agreement number U01CK000509, funded by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to the Northeast Regional Center for Excellence in Vector Borne Diseases. Its contents are solely the responsibility of the authors and do not necessarily represent the official views of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention or the Department of Health and Human Services. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript. Further support was provided by NIH/NIAID R01-AI095491.
Funding Information:
The help of so many people made this experiment possible! Thank you to Sakina Isadibir and Summer Kotb for handling the guinea pig and rearing the Princeton colony, Sean Lee, Sylvie Pitcher, and Elisabeth Martin for help with rearing and pilot experiments, and Dr. Erika Mudrak for statistical help. Also thank you to everyone in the McBride lab who provided additional help: Dr. Lukas Weiss, Timothy Schwanitz, and Vitor Dos Anjos. We also greatly appreciate the help from groups that assisted with site identification and/or mosquito collections, including Martin County Mosquito Control, Suffolk Mosquito Control District, Dr. Goudarz Molaei, the USAMD-AFRIMS Vector Biology and Control Team, and collection team at Centre for Research in Infectious Diseases, Yaoundé, Cameroon.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2023, The Author(s).
PY - 2023/12
Y1 - 2023/12
N2 - Laboratory and field-based studies of the invasive mosquito Aedes albopictus demonstrate its competency to transmit over twenty different pathogens linked to a broad range of vertebrate hosts. The vectorial capacity of Ae. albopictus to transmit these pathogens remains unclear, partly due to knowledge gaps regarding its feeding behavior. Blood meal analyses from field-captured specimens have shown vastly different feeding patterns, with a wide range of anthropophagy (human feeding) and host diversity. To address this knowledge gap, we asked whether differences in innate host preference may drive observed variation in Ae. albopictus feeding patterns in nature. Low generation colonies (F2–F4) were established with field-collected mosquitoes from three populations with high reported anthropophagy (Thailand, Cameroon, and Florida, USA) and three populations in the United States with low reported anthropophagy (New York, Maryland, and Virginia). The preference of these Ae. albopictus colonies for human versus non-human animal odor was assessed in a dual-port olfactometer along with control Ae. aegypti colonies already known to show divergent behavior in this assay. All Ae. albopictus colonies were less likely (p < 0.05) to choose the human-baited port than the anthropophilic Ae. aegypti control, instead behaving similarly to zoophilic Ae. aegypti. Our results suggest that variation in reported Ae. albopictus feeding patterns are not driven by differences in innate host preference, but may result from differences in host availability. This work is the first to compare Ae. albopictus and Ae. aegypti host preference directly and provides insight into differential vectorial capacity and human feeding risk.
AB - Laboratory and field-based studies of the invasive mosquito Aedes albopictus demonstrate its competency to transmit over twenty different pathogens linked to a broad range of vertebrate hosts. The vectorial capacity of Ae. albopictus to transmit these pathogens remains unclear, partly due to knowledge gaps regarding its feeding behavior. Blood meal analyses from field-captured specimens have shown vastly different feeding patterns, with a wide range of anthropophagy (human feeding) and host diversity. To address this knowledge gap, we asked whether differences in innate host preference may drive observed variation in Ae. albopictus feeding patterns in nature. Low generation colonies (F2–F4) were established with field-collected mosquitoes from three populations with high reported anthropophagy (Thailand, Cameroon, and Florida, USA) and three populations in the United States with low reported anthropophagy (New York, Maryland, and Virginia). The preference of these Ae. albopictus colonies for human versus non-human animal odor was assessed in a dual-port olfactometer along with control Ae. aegypti colonies already known to show divergent behavior in this assay. All Ae. albopictus colonies were less likely (p < 0.05) to choose the human-baited port than the anthropophilic Ae. aegypti control, instead behaving similarly to zoophilic Ae. aegypti. Our results suggest that variation in reported Ae. albopictus feeding patterns are not driven by differences in innate host preference, but may result from differences in host availability. This work is the first to compare Ae. albopictus and Ae. aegypti host preference directly and provides insight into differential vectorial capacity and human feeding risk.
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U2 - 10.1038/s41598-022-26591-3
DO - 10.1038/s41598-022-26591-3
M3 - Article
C2 - 36599854
AN - SCOPUS:85145511109
SN - 2045-2322
VL - 13
JO - Scientific reports
JF - Scientific reports
IS - 1
M1 - 130
ER -