I'm happy to share our new study on bacterial communities associated with Anopheles darlingi immature stages and their breeding sites 🦟🦠🧵 doi.org/10.1186/s13071-023-0…

I hope you have as much fun reading our work as we did from the first brainstorms, adding ideas to tell a good story, and finally seeing our paper published 🤓

My deep gratitude to all the co-authors who enthusiastically participated in this study. @lemv24, @marirdavid, @FernandesGR, @RafaelMacielde9, Luciano A. Moreira, and @Biollorenzo

This is a prime example, among many others 🦫, of how organisms can shape their surroundings to boost their chances of survival

In summary, our findings suggest that gravid Aedes agypti can spike breeding sites with symbiotic bacteria creating a more favorable environment for their offspring 🦟❤️🦠, which could be interpreted as a form of niche construction

We were able to isolate this bacterium from field-collected mosquitoes and decided to test whether it exerts a positive effect on larvae. Nailed it! 🏆The bacterium was able to accelerate larval development

We also identified the main microbial player that seems to take over the community, prevailing over other bacteria 🦠📈

16S rRNA gene amplicon sequencing data analyses showed that gravid female-generated breeding sites differed significantly from all other conditions. These particular scenarios showed that females induce a significant decrease in microbial diversity through oviposition 🦟🥚

Then, we comparatively assess the microbiota found on gravid female-generated breeding sites (a female ovipositing on the water) with those in control conditions in which breeding sites were either visited by a non-gravid female or not visited by a female (eggs deposited by us)

For this, we first showed that gravid mosquitoes mechanically transfer viable bacteria to agar plates after females had contacted them 🧫🦟. These bacteria seemed like good candidates as they have been frequently reported as key members of the mosquito microbiota

We know that the bacteria present in breeding sites support larval development because they serve as food 🦠. Since mom knows best, we hypothesized that ovipositing females could promote the development of their babies by inoculating their aquatic habitats with symbiotic partners

Have you ever wondered how a mosquito can be so successful in urban environments where small containers containing rainwater, mostly nutrient-poor habitats, can become suitable breeding sites for its offspring to thrive? 🤔Well, we did it!

There is always more to learn about mosquitoes 🦟and we have an interesting story to share in our recent paper available now in @BMCBiology. Egg-laying by female Aedes aegypti shapes the bacterial communities of breeding sites 🧵 bmcbiol.biomedcentral.com/ar…