Aedes albopictus – Unpleasant, yes, but we need to talk about Wolbachia!

A Tiger mosquito (compare the white marks on the back with A. aegypti) in action.

Mosquitos are known as the group of animals that is responsible for the most fatalities (followed by humans and snakes usually). This is, as we know because they carry some serious diseases. The Tiger mosquito potentially carries yellow fever virus, dengue fever, and Chikungunya fever. It has spread around the globe and is in 4th place within the 100 worst invasive species. The African Landsnail is No. 2, and we will also see No. 3 on picmybug in the future!

Aedes (established by the German Johann Wilhelm Meigen in 1818) is Greek and means unpleasant. I guess we all agree to that. So how to deal with the deadliest animal on the planet? There is more than N,N-Diethyl-meta-toluamide and genetic modification!

The main act in our story is called Wolbachia! This is a naturally occurring bacterium that lives in arthropods. Members of this genus are everywhere, they are said to be the most common parasite on earth. And they have power. These bacteria change the biology of their hosts to their benefit. It reads like science fiction.

Imagine you are a bacterium, and you can only spread via the eggs of your host. How would you increase your chances? You could kill the male eggs so that more females can live and lay more eggs. Or you turn males into females – more eggs for you. Or why not enable parthenogenesis, so that females don’t need any male at all to lay fertile eggs? And of course, you can hinder males to reproduce with non-infected females, because males cannot spread your brood. Ah, and why not make infected females fitter, healthier, and more productive, that would also help to spread you. Unbelievable, all these are possible techniques for Wolbachia, the most common parasite in the world, to spread.

And the last point closes the arch to mosquito-transmitted infections: Wolbachia-infected mosquitos are resistant to such viruses. Means when you spread Wolbachia within mosquitos, they won’t carry dengue or yellow fever. Click hier for more information, it is happening for years already!

And just a side-note, there are more than 10,000 microbial species in our body… Read more hier!