Something “hairy” in juvenile hormone signaling for mosquito reproduction

Microarrays reveal discrete phases in juvenile hormone regulation of mosquito reproduction.

Mosquitoes are vectors of some of the world’s most devastating human diseases: malaria, dengue fever, and yellow fever in the tropics, and encephalitis and West Nile virus in the United States. The female mosquito usually requires a blood meal before she makes a batch of eggs, and one for each subsequent batch thereafter. This repeated blood feeding makes her an exceptional disease vector, pick...

Molecular Evolution of Juvenile Hormone Signaling

Four-way regulation of mosquito yolk protein precursor genes by juvenile hormone-, ecdysone-, nutrient-, and insulin-like peptide signaling pathways

Anautogenous mosquito females require a meal of vertebrate blood in order to initiate the production of yolk protein precursors by the fat body. Yolk protein precursor gene expression is tightly repressed in a state-of-arrest before blood meal-related signals activate it and expression levels rise rapidly. The best understood example of yolk protein precursor gene regulation is the vitellogenin...

Identification of two cationic amino acid transporters required for nutritional signaling during mosquito reproduction.

The defining characteristic of anautogenous mosquitoes is their requirement for a blood meal to initiate reproduction. The need for blood drives the association of vector and host, and is the primary reason why anautogenous mosquitoes are effective disease vectors. During mosquito vitellogenesis, a key process in reproduction, yolk protein precursor (YPP) gene expression is activated specifical...

Vitellogenin, juvenile hormone, insulin signaling, and queen honey bee longevity.

In most animals, longevity is achieved at the expense of fertility, but queen honey bees do not show this tradeoff. Queens are both long-lived and fertile, whereas workers, derived from the same genome, are both relatively short-lived and normally sterile. It has been suggested, on the basis of results from workers, that vitellogenin (Vg), best known as a yolk protein synthesized in the abdomin...