Salivary gland composition of some Old World vector sand fly.

The saliva of blood feeding arthropods has a variety of substances that are responsible for blood meal success. The composition and the influence of sand fly saliva vary considerably between species and even between populations of different geographical origin. In Old-World sand flies (Phlebotomus sp.) differences in protein components of the salivary gland homogenate were demonstrated between species and between colonies of the same species. We compared protein components in the salivary glands of sand flies vectors from different species and origins. The salivary gland homogenate (SGH) of laboratory reared Egyptian phlebotomine sand flies, P. papatasi, P. sergenti and P. langeroni Sinai and El-Agamy strains respectively were compared with Spanish naturally caught P. perniciosus and P. ariasi, which were collected from a farm 20 km southwest of Barcelona. Polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis (PAGE) (SDS-PAGE) was done for compareson. The electrophoresis profiles of SGH differed between all tested species. From 8-14 prominent proteins bands with molecular masses ranging from 8-70 kDa were visualized by Commassie blue gel code staining in each SGH. So, saliva composition varied between species and sub-species, and increased between different sub-genera and geographical areas. The data are important for the characterization of salivary proteins.