Antibiotic Treatment in <i>Anopheles coluzzii</i> Affects Carbon and Nitrogen Metabolism

The mosquito microbiota reduces the vector competence of <i>Anopheles</i> to <i>Plasmodium</i> and affects host fitness; it is therefore considered as a potential target to reduce malaria transmission. While immune induction, secretion of antimicrobials and metabolic competit...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Estelle Chabanol, Volker Behrends, Ghislaine Prévot, George K. Christophides, Mathilde Gendrin
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: MDPI AG 2020-08-01
Series:Pathogens
Subjects:
Online Access:https://www.mdpi.com/2076-0817/9/9/679
Description
Summary:The mosquito microbiota reduces the vector competence of <i>Anopheles</i> to <i>Plasmodium</i> and affects host fitness; it is therefore considered as a potential target to reduce malaria transmission. While immune induction, secretion of antimicrobials and metabolic competition are three typical mechanisms of microbiota-mediated protection against invasive pathogens in mammals, the involvement of metabolic competition or mutualism in mosquito-microbiota and microbiota-<i>Plasmodium</i> interactions has not been investigated. Here, we describe a metabolome analysis of the midgut of <i>Anopheles coluzzii</i> provided with a sugar-meal or a non-infectious blood-meal, under conventional or antibiotic-treated conditions. We observed that the antibiotic treatment affects the tricarboxylic acid cycle and nitrogen metabolism, notably resulting in decreased abundance of free amino acids. Linking our results with published data, we identified pathways which may participate in microbiota-<i>Plasmodium</i> interactions via metabolic interactions or immune modulation and thus would be interesting candidates for future functional studies.
ISSN:2076-0817