1 / 1

Spatial and Temporal Variation of Wolbachia in Aedes albopictus

Introduction. Methods.

danno
Download Presentation

Spatial and Temporal Variation of Wolbachia in Aedes albopictus

An Image/Link below is provided (as is) to download presentation Download Policy: Content on the Website is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use and may not be sold / licensed / shared on other websites without getting consent from its author. Content is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use only. Download presentation by click this link. While downloading, if for some reason you are not able to download a presentation, the publisher may have deleted the file from their server. During download, if you can't get a presentation, the file might be deleted by the publisher.

E N D

Presentation Transcript

  1. Introduction Methods Wolbachia is a group of bacteria that are inherited intracellularly. This group of bacteria affect a wide range of arthropods. The reason this group of bacteria have been able to remain within the mosquito populations is because they use a relatively novel evolutionary strategy which is reproductive parasitism1. The Wolbachia infection has been able to spread because it changes the reproductive success of it’s host. It is more advantageous for an infected female to mate than an uninfected female because infected females can mate with either uninfected males or infected ones, but uninfected females can only mate with uninfected males. Eventually, one would expect to see a rise in Wolbachia infect because there are just not as many opportunities for uninfected females to mate. Genomic DNA was extracted from individual Aedesalbopictus mosquitoes. Following that process, the DNA was amplified under optimal Polymerase Chain Reaction conditions. The DNA was amplified for the primers Wsp 16S, Wlb A, and Wlb B. Once this was completed the amplified DNA was run on 1.5% agarose gel to determine what strain was present in each mosquito. The primer Wsp 16S was run first on each mosquito before the other two primers were run. This was done because Wsp 16S shows whether or not a mosquito is infected with any strain of Wolbachia. Following that, each mosquito was run using the primer Wlb A and Wlb B. These are both strains of the infection and the test showed us what type of Wolbachia was present in each mosquito. The picture below is an example of what the gel would look like after DNA was run through it. The Wlb A strain is 470 base pairs in length and the Wlb B strain is 460 base pairs in length. In each run on the gel below, the top line represents Wlb A and the line underneath it represents Wlb B. Spatial and Temporal Variation of Wolbachia in Aedesalbopictus e) Objectives Significance The objectives of this study are: Analyze the frequency of Wolbachia infection within Aedesalbopictus across three different years within the same localities. Obtaining multi-year frequency data of infections will allow me to determine potential temporal variation of the two strains of Wolbachia within a few mosquito populations. Analyze the frequency of Wolbachia infection with Aedesalbopictus across several localities of the same time period. Obtaining frequency data for several localities within the same year will allow me to determine the spatial variation of the two different strains of Wolbachia within one year. This study has significance when it comes to pest control. Wolbachia controls pests by using CytoplasmicIncompatability. This occurs because uninfected females can only mate with uninfected males. However, infected females can mate with both uninfected males and infected males. Overtime this will drive the number of uninfected males and females down. Wolbachia has also been reported to cause early death of male embryos. As the population of mosquitoes continues to breed, the dominant part of that population will be infected females who either are breeding and losing many of their embryos, or are not breeding because they cannot find any males to mate with. If Wolbachia would be placed in a population where mosquitoes are numerous, it could really decrease the fitness and the frequency of mosquitoes. References Study sites Acknowledgements All of the sites that mosquitoes were collected from were in Tampa, FL. All of the sites were cemeteries in the area and the mosquitoes were collected in or near vases. Some of the cemeteries were: Woodlawn, Oak Hill, Austriano-Centurian, Rosehill, North 25th, and Myrtle Hill Cemetery. Most of the sites were sampled in 2003, 2005, 2006, and 2009. Dr. Sabine Loew Dr. Steven Juliano Dr. KavithaDamal Dr. Erik Larson Dr. Rachel Bowden Barry, A. (2010, May 6). Bmore Scientific. Charm City Current. Retrieved September 22, 2010, from charmcitycurrent.com/bmorescientific/ Bourtzis, K., & O'Neill, S. (1998). Wolbachia Infections and Arthropod Reproductions. BioScience, 48(4), 287-293. Jeong, G., & Suh, E. (2008). Wolbachia-induced Reproductive Anomalies and Their Future Applications. Entomological Research, 38, 41-48. Marshall, J. (n.d.). Gene drive systems for spreading refractory genes. John Marshall. Retrieved September 23, 2010, from http://johnmm.bol.ucla.edu/geneDrive.htm OBGYN Academy. (n.d.). Human Genetics. Retrieved September 23, 2010, from www.obgynacademy.com/basicsciences/fetology/genetics/ Reiter, P., Amador, M. A., Anderson, R. A., & Clark, G. G. (1995). Short Report: Dispersal of AedesAegypti in an Urban Area after Blood Feeding as Demonstrated by Rubidium-Marked Eggs. The American Journal of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene , 52(2), 177-179. StateMaster - Maps of Florida (31 in total). (n.d.). StateMaster - USA maps (1,144 state maps). Retrieved September 23, 2010, from http://maps.statemaster.com/state/FL/1

More Related