Culex tritaeniorhynchus Giles, 1901 and Culex quinquefasciatus Say, 1823 is an important vector of Japanese encephalitis and Bancroftian filariasis, respectively in India and South East Asian countries. In this paper, we are describing the surface morphology and morphometrics of the egg of C. tritaeniorhynchus in comparison with C. quinquefasciatus for the first time. The results indicated that eggs of both the species appears to be similar to great extent in surface morphology, however, morphometrics provide 56.81% demarking attributes out of 44 attributes at various significant levels (p < 0.05-0.001), i.e., egg length, width and ratio of length/width, attributes of micropylar apparatus including corolla, disc, mound, tubercles size, and length of tubercular rows in micropylar region, size and density of tubercles, exochorionic pore in conical-shaped regions of eggs, and size of tubercular wheel units. Structurally, the additional presence of large tubercles strengthens the micropylar region to bear various collapsing forces in these species.
Staphylococcal enterotoxin B (SEB) is a potent foodborne pathogen and categorized as a class B type of biological warfare agent. In this research work, SEB is detected by various sensitive analytical methods such as enzyme linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA), quantum dots-based fluorescence linked immunosorbent assay (QDs-FLISA) and square-wave voltammetry (SWV). The obtained results were compared in terms of sensitivity, ease of experimentation and analysis time. For the QD-based detection, fluorescent lead sulfide (PbS) QDs were prepared by a bottom-up approach and characterized by various techniques. Highly specific antibodies against SEB were conjugated with the prepared PbS QDs and were used as revealing antibodies. For the electrochemical detection of SEB, rabbit anti-SEB polyclonal antibodies (primary antibodies) were immobilized on screen-printed electrodes (SPEs) followed by the addition of various concentrations of SEB antigen. These electrodes were further incubated with revealing antibodies. Finally, 1 M HCl solution was added to the SPE to dissolve the PbS QDs which were captured in a sandwiched immunoassay, and resulting Pb 2+ ions were determined by the SWV method using a glassy-carbon electrode. The obtained peak current is proportional to the amount of Pb 2+ ions which indirectly depends on the SEB concentration. Linearity was observed in the concentration range of 1 ng mL À1 to 1 mg mL À1 of SEB antigen. The limit of detection was found to be 0.01 ng mL À1 for SEB.The results reveal that electrochemical SWV sensing is much easier, faster and provides high sensitivity as compared to the other methods. It is found that the detection limits achieved for sandwich ELISA and QDs-FLISA were 0.24 ng mL À1 and 0.03 ng mL À1 respectively. In addition, the developed SWV method can be implemented for the on-site detection of SEB particularly for civil and defense applications where security is of prime importance.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.