Meeting Abstract
The northern house mosquito, Culex pipiens, is a pest species that is capable of serving as a vector for diseases such as West Nile Virus and St. Louis encephalitis. Diapause is essential for this species to successfully survive adverse winter conditions and is marked by increased lipid storage and reduced activity levels. Although much is known about the physiological and molecular underpinnings of mosquito diapause, how microbial symbionts influence this complicated process has been largely ignored. This could represent a substantial gap in diapause knowledge, as microbial symbionts have been repeatedly shown to influence various physiological processes in mosquitoes. Illumina sequencing of 16s rRNAs revealed that community profiles do not differ significantly between diapausing and nondiapausing individuals. This suggests that there is no specific midgut microbial community associated with C. pipiens diapause. Although a specific community profile is not necessary to undergo diapause, preliminary studies suggest that the presence of microbiota can alter lipid accumulation during diapause preparation. Specifically, diapausing females lacking gut bacteria accumulate proportionally less lipid reserves than their nondiapausing aposymbiotic counterparts. Future, studies will examine the mechanism in which the microbiota affects lipid accumulation and whether the reduced lipid stores affects survivorship or fecundity post diapause.
