Behavioural and physiological state dependency of host seeking in the blood-sucking insect Rhodnius prolixus

Vertebrate blood is essential for the growth and the reproduction of haematophagous insects. Provided that hosts play the double role of food sources and predators, feeding on their blood exposes these insects to a high predation risk. Therefore, it is expected that host seeking occurs only when insects need to feed. In the present study, we analyse how the feeding status affects the response to host-associated cues in the blood-sucking insect Rhodnius prolixus. We show that the responsiveness to host-associated cues, such as CO2 and heat, and that the motivation to feed depend on the time elapsed since a blood meal. Depending on the time elapsed after feeding, the same concentration of CO2 may attract or repel the insects. As far as we know, this is the first time that a host signal has been shown to be repellent for a haematophagous insect. The response to heat is also modulated but no repellence was observed. When blood was replaced by saline solution as food, a significant reduction of the response to both signals was evinced but repellence was not observed. The injection of haemolymph from fed insects into starved insects inhibited the response of the receiver insects to both signals but this was not observed after the injection of saline solution or of haemolymph from non-fed insects. This is the first time that the modulation of feeding behaviour by the feeding status has been analysed in a hemimetabolous blood-sucking insect, fully excluding any effect of other processes, such as reproduction.