How to translate text using browser tools
1 July 2013 Multiple Blood Feeding and Host-Seeking Behavior in Aedes aegypti and Aedes albopictus (Diptera: Culicidae)
Thahsin Farjana, Nobuko Tuno
Author Affiliations +
Abstract

The body size of mosquitoes can influence a number of bionomic factors, such as their blood-feeding ability, host attack rate, and fecundity. All of these traits are important determinants of their potential to transmit diseases. Among abiotic and biotic factors, high temperature and low nutrition in the developing stages of mosquitoes generally result in small adults. We studied the relationship between body size and multiple feeding in a gonotrophic cycle and some fecundity attributes by using three strains of two competent vector species, Aedes aegypti (L.) and Aedes albopictus (Skuse). We raised small and large mosquitoes under low and high food conditions in the laboratory to measure parameters of fecundity and blood-feeding behavior. Fecundity was positively correlated with body size in both species, whereas the number of bloodmeals, the frequency of host-seeking behavior, and egg retention were negatively correlated with body size in the Ae. albopictus Nagasaki strain. We found that multiple feeding and host-seeking behavior were negatively correlated with body size, i.e., small mosquitoes tended to have more contact with hosts. We found that two mechanisms that inhibit engorged mosquitoes from seeking out hosts, distension-induced and oocyte-induced inhibition, were not strong enough to limit host-seeking behavior, and multiple feeding increased fecundity. Size-dependent multiple feeding and host-seeking behavior affect contact frequency with hosts and should be considered when predicting how changes in mosquito body size affect disease transmission.

© 2013 Entomological Society of America
Thahsin Farjana and Nobuko Tuno "Multiple Blood Feeding and Host-Seeking Behavior in Aedes aegypti and Aedes albopictus (Diptera: Culicidae)," Journal of Medical Entomology 50(4), 838-846, (1 July 2013). https://doi.org/10.1603/ME12146
Received: 3 July 2012; Accepted: 1 March 2013; Published: 1 July 2013
JOURNAL ARTICLE
9 PAGES

This article is only available to subscribers.
It is not available for individual sale.
+ SAVE TO MY LIBRARY

KEYWORDS
biting behavior
body size
mosquito
RIGHTS & PERMISSIONS
Get copyright permission
Back to Top