Novel strains in malaria vectors from Sub-Saharan Africa.

, a common insect endosymbiotic bacterium that can influence pathogen transmission and manipulate host reproduction, has historically been considered absent from the  genera, but has recently been found in  s.l. populations in West Africa.  As there are numerous  species that have the capacity to transmit malaria, we analysed a range of species across five malaria endemic countries to determine  prevalence rates, characterise novel  strains and determine any correlation between the presence of  ,   and the competing bacterium  .  adult mosquitoes were collected from five malaria-endemic countries: Guinea, Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), Ghana, Uganda and Madagascar, between 2013 and 2017.  Molecular analysis was undertaken using quantitative PCR, Sanger sequencing,  multilocus sequence typing (MLST) and high-throughput amplicon sequencing of the bacterial   gene.  : Novel  strains were discovered in five species:  ,  s.s.,  ,  and   species A, increasing the number of  species known to be naturally infected. Variable prevalence rates in different locations were observed and novel strains were phylogenetically diverse, clustering with  supergroup B strains.  We also provide evidence for resident strain variants within  . species A.   is the dominant member of the microbiome in  and   species A but present at lower densities in  .  Interestingly, no evidence of  co-infections was seen and   infection densities were shown to be variable and location dependent.  The important discovery of novel  strains in  provides greater insight into the prevalence of resident  strains in diverse malaria vectors.  Novel  strains (particularly high-density strains) are ideal candidate strains for transinfection to create stable infections in other  mosquito species, which could be used for population replacement or suppression control strategies.