Pigeault R, Vézilier J, Nicot A, Gandon S, Rivero A
MIVEGEC, UMR CNRS 5290, Montpellier, France
MIVEGEC, UMR CNRS 5290, Montpellier, France CEFE, UMR CNRS 5175, Montpellier, France.
Biol Lett. 2015 Mar;11(3). doi: 10.1098/rsbl.2014.1025.
Transgenerational effects of infection have a huge potential to influence the prevalence and intensity of infections in vectors and, by extension, disease epidemiology. These transgenerational effects may increase the fitness of offspring through the transfer of protective immune factors. Alternatively, however, infected mothers may transfer the costs of infection to their offspring. Although transgenerational immune protection has been described in a dozen invertebrate species, we still lack a complete picture of the incidence and importance of transgenerational effects of infection in most invertebrate groups. The existence of transgenerational infection effects in mosquito vectors is of particular interest because of their potential for influencing parasite prevalence and intensity and, by extension, disease transmission. Here we present what we believe to be the first study on transgenerational infection effects in a mosquito vector infected with malaria parasites. The aim of this experiment was to quantify both the benefits and the costs of having an infected mother. We find no evidence of transgenerational protection in response to a Plasmodium infection. Having an infected mother does, however, entail considerable fecundity costs for the offspring: fecundity loss is three times higher in infected offspring issued from infected mothers than in infected offspring issued from uninfected mothers. We discuss the implications of our results and we call for more studies looking at transgenerational effects of infection in disease vectors.
感染的跨代效应极有可能影响病媒中感染的流行程度和强度，进而影响疾病流行病学。这些跨代效应可能通过保护性免疫因子的传递提高后代的适应性。然而，受感染的母亲也可能将感染的代价传递给她们的后代。尽管在十几种无脊椎动物物种中已描述了跨代免疫保护现象，但对于大多数无脊椎动物群体中感染的跨代效应的发生率和重要性，我们仍缺乏全面的了解。蚊媒中跨代感染效应的存在尤其令人关注，因为它们有可能影响寄生虫的流行程度和强度，进而影响疾病传播。在此，我们展示了我们认为的关于感染疟原虫的蚊媒中跨代感染效应的第一项研究。本实验的目的是量化有受感染母亲所带来的益处和代价。我们没有发现疟原虫感染引发跨代保护的证据。然而，有受感染的母亲确实会给后代带来相当大的繁殖力代价：受感染母亲所生的受感染后代的繁殖力损失比未受感染母亲所生的受感染后代高出三倍。我们讨论了研究结果的意义，并呼吁开展更多关于病媒中感染跨代效应的研究。
