BACKGROUND: Despite long-term research on dirofilariosis in Slovakia, little attention has thus far been paid to Dirofilaria vectors. The particular aim of the present study was molecular screening for filarioid parasites in two different habitats of Bratislava, the capital city of Slovakia. In addition, the effect of urbanisation on mosquito species abundance and composition, associated with the risk of mosquito-borne infections, was studied and discussed. METHODS: Mosquitoes were identified by morphological features, and molecular methods were also used for determination of selected individuals belonging to cryptic species from the Anopheles maculipennis and Culex pipiens complexes. The presence of filarioid DNA (Dirofilaria repens, Dirofilaria immitis and Setaria spp.) was detected using standard PCR approaches and sequencing. RESULTS: A total of 6957 female mosquitoes were collected for the study. Overall, the most abundant mosquito species was Aedes vexans, closely followed by unidentified members of the Cx. pipiens complex and the less numerous but still plentiful Ochlerotatus sticticus species. Further investigation of mosquito material revealed 4.26% relative prevalence of Dirofilaria spp., whereby both species, D. repens and D. immitis, were identified. The majority of positive mosquito pools had their origin in a floodplain area on the outskirts of the city, with a relative prevalence of 5.32%; only two mosquito pools (1.26%) were shown to be positive in the residential zone of Bratislava. Setaria spp. DNA was not detected in mosquitoes within this study. CONCLUSIONS: The study presented herein represents initial research focused on molecular mosquito screening for filarioid parasites in urban and urban-fringe habitats of Bratislava, Slovakia. Molecular analyses within the Cx. pipiens complex identified two biotypes: Cx. pipiens biotype pipiens and Cx. pipiens biotype molestus. To our knowledge, Dirofilaria spp. were detected for the first time in Slovakia in mosquitoes other than Ae. vexans, i.e. D. repens in Anopheles messeae and unidentified members of An. maculipennis and Cx. pipiens complexes, and D. immitis in Coquillettidia richiardii and Cx. pipiens biotype pipiens. Both dirofilarial species were found in Och. sticticus. The suitable conditions for the vectors' biology would represent the main risk factor for dirofilariosis transmission.
- MeSH
- Anopheles anatomie a histologie klasifikace genetika růst a vývoj MeSH
- Culex anatomie a histologie klasifikace genetika růst a vývoj MeSH
- Dirofilaria immitis genetika izolace a purifikace MeSH
- Dirofilaria repens genetika izolace a purifikace MeSH
- dirofilarióza epidemiologie přenos MeSH
- hodnocení rizik MeSH
- komáří přenašeči anatomie a histologie klasifikace genetika růst a vývoj MeSH
- populační dynamika * MeSH
- Setaria (Nematoda) genetika izolace a purifikace MeSH
- setariáza epidemiologie přenos MeSH
- urbanizace * MeSH
- zvířata MeSH
- Check Tag
- zvířata MeSH
- Publikační typ
- časopisecké články MeSH
- práce podpořená grantem MeSH
- Geografické názvy
- Slovenská republika epidemiologie MeSH
Recent advances in sequencing allow population-genomic data to be generated for virtually any species. However, approaches to analyse such data lag behind the ability to generate it, particularly in nonmodel species. Linkage disequilibrium (LD, the nonrandom association of alleles from different loci) is a highly sensitive indicator of many evolutionary phenomena including chromosomal inversions, local adaptation and geographical structure. Here, we present linkage disequilibrium network analysis (LDna), which accesses information on LD shared between multiple loci genomewide. In LD networks, vertices represent loci, and connections between vertices represent the LD between them. We analysed such networks in two test cases: a new restriction-site-associated DNA sequence (RAD-seq) data set for Anopheles baimaii, a Southeast Asian malaria vector; and a well-characterized single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) data set from 21 three-spined stickleback individuals. In each case, we readily identified five distinct LD network clusters (single-outlier clusters, SOCs), each comprising many loci connected by high LD. In A. baimaii, further population-genetic analyses supported the inference that each SOC corresponds to a large inversion, consistent with previous cytological studies. For sticklebacks, we inferred that each SOC was associated with a distinct evolutionary phenomenon: two chromosomal inversions, local adaptation, population-demographic history and geographic structure. LDna is thus a useful exploratory tool, able to give a global overview of LD associated with diverse evolutionary phenomena and identify loci potentially involved. LDna does not require a linkage map or reference genome, so it is applicable to any population-genomic data set, making it especially valuable for nonmodel species.
- MeSH
- Anopheles klasifikace genetika MeSH
- chromozomální inverze * MeSH
- jednonukleotidový polymorfismus MeSH
- molekulární evoluce MeSH
- populační genetika metody MeSH
- sekvenční analýza DNA MeSH
- shluková analýza MeSH
- Smegmamorpha klasifikace genetika MeSH
- vazebná nerovnováha * MeSH
- výpočetní biologie metody MeSH
- zvířata MeSH
- Check Tag
- zvířata MeSH
- Publikační typ
- časopisecké články MeSH
- hodnotící studie MeSH
- práce podpořená grantem MeSH
- MeSH
- Anopheles genetika MeSH
- Arabidopsis genetika MeSH
- chromozomy genetika MeSH
- DNA genetika MeSH
- Drosophila melanogaster genetika MeSH
- eukaryotické buňky metabolismus MeSH
- finanční podpora výzkumu jako téma MeSH
- lidé MeSH
- zastoupení bazí imunologie MeSH
- zvířata MeSH
- Check Tag
- lidé MeSH
- zvířata MeSH
- Publikační typ
- srovnávací studie MeSH
