CNRS, UMR2000, Institut Pasteur, 75724, Paris, Cedex 15, France.
MRC-University of Glasgow Centre for Virus Research, G61 1QH, Glasgow, Scotland.
Sci Rep. 2019 Mar 15;9(1):4669. doi: 10.1038/s41598-019-41094-4.
Human malaria, which remains a major public health problem, is transmitted by a subset of Anopheles mosquitoes belonging to only three out of eight subgenera: Anopheles, Cellia and Nyssorhynchus. Unlike almost every other insect species, males of some Anopheles species produce steroid hormones which are transferred to females during copulation to influence their reproduction. Steroids are consequently a potential target for malaria vector control. Here, we analysed the evolution of sexually-transferred steroids and their effects on female reproductive traits across Anopheles by using a set of 16 mosquito species (five Anopheles, eight Cellia, and three Nyssorhynchus), including malaria vector and non-vector species. We show that male steroid production and transfer are specific to the Cellia and therefore represent a synapomorphy of this subgenus. Furthermore, we show that mating-induced effects in females are variable across species and differences are not correlated with sexually-transferred steroids or with Anopheles ability to transmit human malaria. Overall, our findings highlight that Anopheles mosquitoes have evolved different reproductive strategies, independently of being a malaria vector or not.
人类疟疾仍然是一个主要的公共卫生问题，由属于三个亚属（疟蚊属、塞利亚蚊属和按蚊属）而非八个亚属中的一小部分按蚊传播。与几乎所有其他昆虫物种不同，一些按蚊种的雄性产生类固醇激素，这些激素在交配时转移到雌性体内，影响它们的繁殖。因此，类固醇是疟疾媒介控制的一个潜在目标。在这里，我们通过使用一组 16 种蚊子（五种疟蚊、八种塞利亚蚊和三种按蚊），包括疟疾媒介和非媒介物种，分析了性传播类固醇及其对按蚊雌性生殖特征的进化作用。我们表明，雄性类固醇的产生和转移是塞利亚蚊特有的，因此代表了这个亚属的一个synapomorphy。此外，我们表明，交配诱导的雌性效应在物种间是可变的，差异与性传播类固醇或按蚊传播人类疟疾的能力无关。总的来说，我们的研究结果强调了按蚊蚊子已经进化出不同的繁殖策略，而与是否是疟疾媒介无关。
