Journal
PROCEEDINGS OF THE ROYAL SOCIETY B-BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES
Volume 271, Issue -, Pages S152-S155Publisher
ROYAL SOC
DOI: 10.1098/rsbl.2003.0120
Keywords
blood feeding; parasite-host webs; land-water interactions; claw morphology
Categories
Ask authors/readers for more resources
Blood-feeding blackflies (Diptera: Simuliidae) transmit pathogens, harass vertebrate hosts and may cause lethal injuries in attacked victims, but with traditional methods it has proved difficult to identify their hosts. By matching mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) sequences in blood collected from engorged blackflies with stored sequences in the GenBank database, relationships between 17 blackfly species and 25 species of vertebrate hosts were revealed. Our results demonstrate a predominance of large hosts and marked discrimination between blackflies using either avian or mammalian hosts. Such information is of vital interest in studies of disease transmission, coevolutionary relationships, population ecology and wildlife management.
Authors
I am an author on this paper
Click your name to claim this paper and add it to your profile.
Reviews
Recommended
No Data Available