Outdoor biting and daily Plasmodium infection dynamics

For an avian malaria parasite, bites from uninfected mosquitoes increased Plasmodium parasite numbers bird blood, demonstrated in this recent paper. Birds not bitten by mosquitoes didn’t have this increase. (This was during the chronic phase of infection).

 

What time of day is mosquito happy hour? And does malaria go to the same pub?

What time of day is mosquito happy hour? And does malaria go to the same pub?

I found this paragraph interesting (the hyperlinks to the embedded references should work): “..the periodicity of malaria may have evolved as a way to maximize the availability of mature gametocytes when mosquitoes feed [75]. Although this hypothesis remains controversial [76][77] our approach could help identify the conditions that may promote the evolution of cell cycle coordination in malaria as a response to daily fluctuations of vector availability.”

There’s some evidence that malaria may cycle with vector abundance seasonally, but what about daily?

Furthermore, if mosquitoes that bite humans are shifting biting patterns from indoor to outdoor, and late evening to early evening, perhaps because of increased indoor control (LLINs and IRS), will this change anything about how Plasmodium parasites cycle in humans?

What do you all think?

One comment on this post:

  1. Lauren on said:

    1. That mosquito is faaaabulous!
    2. I think Sam Rund http://reece.bio.ed.ac.uk/samuel-rund.html would argue that the time mosquitoes bite could change many things about the parasites in them!
    3. Miss you a lot Jessi!

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