Differential effects of larval and adult nutrition on female survival, fecundity, and size of the yellow fever mosquito, Aedes aegypti
Background: The yellow fever mosquito, Aedes aegypti, is the principal vector of medically-important infectious viruses that cause severe illness such as dengue fever, yellow fever and Zika. The transmission potential of mosquitoes for these arboviruses is largely shaped by their life history traits, such as size, survival and fecundity. These life history traits, to some degree, depend on environmental conditions, such as larval and adult nutrition (e.g., nectar availability). Both these types of nutrition are known to affect the energetic reserves and life history traits of adults, but whether and how nutrition obtained during larval and adult stages have an interactive influence on mosquito life history traits remains largely unknown.
Results: Here, we experimentally manipulated mosquito diets to create two nutritional levels at larval and adult stages , that is, a high or low amount of larval food (HL or LL) during larval stage, and a good and poor adult food (GA or PA, represents normal or weak concentration of sucrose) during adult stage. We then compared the size, survival and fecundity of female mosquitoes reared from these nutritional regimes. We found that larval and adult nutrition affected size and survival, respectively, without interactions, while both larval and adult nutrition influenced fecundity. There was a positive relationship between fecundity and size. In addition, this positive relationship was not affected by nutrition.
Conclusions: These findings highlight how larval and adult nutrition differentially influence female mosquito life history traits, suggesting that studies evaluating nutritional effects on vectorial capacity traits should account for environmental variation across life stages.
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Additional file 1. Wing length, fecundity and survival of Aedes aegypti reared from different treatments. Abbreviations used in the table listed as following. ID: mosquito identity; Treatment-LL+PA: low larval plus poor adult nutrition; Treatment-HL+PA: high larval plus poor adult nutrition; Treatment-LL+GA: low larval plus good adult nutrition; Treatment-HL+GA: high larval plus good adult nutrition. Wing length is recorded to 3 decimal places in mm and measured as described in the main text. Fecundity is represented by the number of eggs laid. Survival is the number of days that the individual lived post-blood-feeding.
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Differential effects of larval and adult nutrition on female survival, fecundity, and size of the yellow fever mosquito, Aedes aegypti
Posted 10 Feb, 2021
Received 18 Feb, 2021
On 03 Feb, 2021
On 02 Feb, 2021
Invitations sent on 02 Feb, 2021
On 02 Feb, 2021
On 02 Feb, 2021
On 11 Jan, 2021
Received 21 Dec, 2020
Received 18 Dec, 2020
Received 18 Dec, 2020
On 08 Dec, 2020
On 06 Dec, 2020
Invitations sent on 06 Dec, 2020
On 06 Dec, 2020
On 05 Dec, 2020
On 05 Dec, 2020
On 05 Dec, 2020
Received 20 Oct, 2020
On 20 Oct, 2020
Received 13 Oct, 2020
On 12 Oct, 2020
Received 01 Oct, 2020
Invitations sent on 10 Sep, 2020
On 10 Sep, 2020
On 10 Sep, 2020
On 17 Aug, 2020
On 17 Aug, 2020
On 16 Aug, 2020
On 16 Aug, 2020
Background: The yellow fever mosquito, Aedes aegypti, is the principal vector of medically-important infectious viruses that cause severe illness such as dengue fever, yellow fever and Zika. The transmission potential of mosquitoes for these arboviruses is largely shaped by their life history traits, such as size, survival and fecundity. These life history traits, to some degree, depend on environmental conditions, such as larval and adult nutrition (e.g., nectar availability). Both these types of nutrition are known to affect the energetic reserves and life history traits of adults, but whether and how nutrition obtained during larval and adult stages have an interactive influence on mosquito life history traits remains largely unknown.
Results: Here, we experimentally manipulated mosquito diets to create two nutritional levels at larval and adult stages , that is, a high or low amount of larval food (HL or LL) during larval stage, and a good and poor adult food (GA or PA, represents normal or weak concentration of sucrose) during adult stage. We then compared the size, survival and fecundity of female mosquitoes reared from these nutritional regimes. We found that larval and adult nutrition affected size and survival, respectively, without interactions, while both larval and adult nutrition influenced fecundity. There was a positive relationship between fecundity and size. In addition, this positive relationship was not affected by nutrition.
Conclusions: These findings highlight how larval and adult nutrition differentially influence female mosquito life history traits, suggesting that studies evaluating nutritional effects on vectorial capacity traits should account for environmental variation across life stages.
Figure 1
Figure 2
Figure 3
Figure 4
Figure 5