A Novel Methodology For Recording Wing Beat Frequencies of Untethered Male and Female Aedes aegypti

Abstract

Aedes aegypti is a vector of many significant arboviruses worldwide, including dengue, Zika, chikungunya, and yellow fever viruses. With vector control methodology pivoting toward rearing and releasing large numbers of insects for either population suppression or virus-blocking, economical remote (sentinel) surveillance methods for release tracking become increasingly necessary. Recent steps in this direction include advances in optical sensors that identify and classify insects based on their wing beat frequency (WBF). As these traps are being developed, there is a strong need to better understand the environmental and biological factors influencing mosquito WBFs. Here, we developed new untethered-subject methodology to detect changes in WBFs of male and female Ae. aegypti. This new methodology involves directing an ultrasonic transducer at a free-flying subject and measuring the Doppler shift of the reflected ultrasonic continuous wave signal. This system's utility was assessed by determining its ability to confirm previous reports on the effect of temperature, body size, and age on the WBFs generated from acoustic or optical-based experiments. The presented ultrasonic method successfully detected expected trends for each factor for both male and female Ae. aegypti without the need for subject manipulation and potential impediment of natural flight dynamics due to tethering. As a result, this ultrasonic methodology provides a new method for understanding the environmental and physiological determinants of male and female WBFs that can inform the design of remote mosquito surveillance systems.

The impact of sublethal permethrin exposure on susceptible and resistant genotypes of the urban disease vector Aedes aegypti

“…aegypti from each of the strains was recorded as described previously. 32 Male and female mosquitoes from the S-Cairns, R-TL and R-BC strains were exposed to sublethal doses of permethrin, as above. After 24 h, single male or female mosquitoes were aspirated from the holding cage into a test vial (60 mL aspirator vial (Bioquip, 2809V, Compton, CA, USA) to record 10 s of uninterrupted flight (i.e.…”

Outcomes from international field trials with Male Aedes Sound Traps: Frequency-dependent effectiveness in capturing target species in relation to bycatch abundance

“…aegypti respond positively to a range of female wingbeat frequencies in natural environments. The wingbeat frequencies displayed by females may vary due to a range of factors such as age, size and even ambient temperature [27,[32][33][34][35][36]. Field populations of Ae.…”

“…Female wingbeat frequencies, and male attraction to these frequencies, are affected by biological and environmental factors, such as male and female body size, age and ambient temperature [27,[32][33][34][35][36]. Additionally, male attraction to various wingbeat frequencies can also change due to their mating experience and larval rearing conditions [25,37].…”

Synchronized swarming: Harmonic convergence and acoustic mating dynamics in the malaria mosquito Anopheles gambiae

“…gambiae laboratory swarm studies 4,9,50 , the incubator was programmed with a 12 h light: 12 h dark photoperiod (two 17-watt fluorescent tube bulbs), including 1 hr of crepuscular lighting (one 5.5-watt LED bulb) at dawn and dusk. Because flight tone frequencies can vary by adult size 21,24,26,32 , rearing methods were designed to obtain fieldsized adult mosquitoes 6,[51][52][53][54] of equivalent sizes between trials. Male and female wing lengths from a subset of individuals from each experimental group were measured as a proxy for overall size as previously described 55 (Supplementary Fig.…”

“…Our finding that flight tone frequencies tend to increase with age confirm earlier trends observed in Ae. aegypti 24 . Similar to previous reports in An.…”