The L1014F Knockdown Resistance Mutation Is Not a Strong Correlate of Phenotypic Resistance to Pyrethroids in Florida Populations of .

is an important target for vector control because of its ability to transmit pathogens that cause disease. Most populations are resistant to pyrethroids and often to organophosphates, the two most common classes of active ingredients used by public health agencies. A knockdown resistance () mutation, resulting in an amino acid change from a leucine to phenylalanine in the voltage gated sodium channel, is one mechanism contributing to the pyrethroid resistant phenotype.

Trends in mosquito species distribution modeling: insights for vector surveillance and disease control.

Species distribution modeling (SDM) has become an increasingly common approach to explore questions about ecology, geography, outbreak risk, and global change as they relate to infectious disease vectors. Here, we conducted a systematic review of the scientific literature, screening 563 abstracts and identifying 204 studies that used SDMs to produce distribution estimates for mosquito species. While the number of studies employing SDM methods has increased markedly over the past decade, the overwhelming majority used a single method (maximum entropy modeling; MaxEnt) and focused on human infectious disease vectors or their close relatives.

Spatiotemporal Environmental Drivers of Eastern Equine Encephalitis Virus in Central Florida: Towards a Predictive Model for a Lethal Disease.

Eastern equine encephalitis virus (EEEV) is a mosquito-borne virus that affects humans and horses, with a high case fatality rate in both species. The virus can be transmitted by several mosquito species and maintained in multiple reservoir hosts, making EEEV dynamics difficult to anticipate. In this study, we identified spatial and temporal factors that precede EEEV detection using sentinel chicken surveillance data from Orange County, Florida, from 2003 to 2017.

Examining Wing Length-Abundance Relationships and Pyrethroid Resistance Mutations among in a Rapidly Growing Urban Area with Implications for Mosquito Surveillance and Control.

is a cosmopolitan mosquito species capable of transmitting arboviruses such as dengue, chikungunya, and Zika. To control this and similar species, public and private entities often rely on pyrethroid insecticides. In this study, we screened collected from June to August 2017 in Mecklenburg County, a rapidly growing urban area of North Carolina, for mutations conferring pyrethroid resistance and examined spatiotemporal patterns of specimen size as measured by wing length, hypothesizing that size variation could be closely linked to local abundance, making this easily measured trait a useful surveillance proxy.

Spatial variation in the frequency of knockdown resistance genotypes in Florida Aedes aegypti populations.

Background: The development of insecticide resistance in disease-vectoring mosquito species can lead to vector control failure and disease resurgence. However, insecticide applications remain an essential public health intervention. In Florida, insecticide resistance in Aedes aegypti, an anthropophilic mosquito species capable of transmitting dengue, chikungunya, and Zika virus, is a major concern.

Loxodonta Localizer: A Software Tool for Inferring the Provenance of African Elephants and Their Ivory Using Mitochondrial DNA.

Illegal hunting is a major threat to the elephants of Africa, with more elephants killed by poachers than die from natural causes. DNA from tusks has been used to infer the source populations for confiscated ivory, relying on nuclear genetic markers. However, mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) sequences can also provide information on the geographic origins of elephants due to female elephant philopatry.

Seasonal and geographic variation in insecticide resistance in Aedes aegypti in southern Ecuador.

Insecticide resistance (IR) can undermine efforts to control vectors of public health importance. Aedes aegypti is the main vector of resurging diseases in the Americas such as yellow fever and dengue, and recently emerging chikungunya and Zika fever, which have caused unprecedented epidemics in the region. Vector control remains the primary intervention to prevent outbreaks of Aedes-transmitted diseases.

Abundance and distribution of sylvatic dengue virus vectors in three different land cover types in Sarawak, Malaysian Borneo.

Background: Mosquito-borne dengue virus (DENV) is maintained in a sylvatic, enzootic cycle of transmission between canopy-dwelling non-human primates and Aedes mosquitoes in Borneo. Sylvatic DENV can spill over into humans living in proximity to forest foci of transmission, in some cases resulting in severe dengue disease. The most likely vectors of such spillover (bridge vectors) in Borneo are Ae.