Monitoring of alien mosquitoes of the genus Aedes (Diptera: Culicidae) in Austria

Abstract

Systematic, continuous mosquito surveillance is considered the most reliable tool to predict the spread and establishment of alien mosquito species such as the Asian tiger mosquito ( Aedes albopictus ), Japanese bush mosquito ( Aedes japonicus ), and the transmission risk of mosquito-borne arboviruses to humans. Only single individuals of Ae. albopictus have been found in Austria so far. However, it is likely that the species will be able to establish populations in the future due to global trade and traffic as well as increasing temperatures in the course of global climate change. In summer 2017, a project surveilling the oviposition of newly introduced Aedes mosquitoes, using ovitraps, was set up by means of citizen scientists and researchers and was performed in six federal provinces of Austria—Tyrol, Carinthia, Vienna, Lower Austria, Styria, and Burgenland. Eggs of Ae. albopictus were identified in Tyrol during the months August and September, while Ae. japonicus was found in Lower Austria, Styria, and Burgenland. In Vienna and Carinthia, all ovitraps were negative for Aedes eggs; however, Ae. japonicus was found for the first time in Vienna in July 2017 during routine sampling of adult mosquitoes. With this project, we demonstrated the benefits of citizen scientists for ovitrap-based mosquito surveillance. The finding of Ae. albopictus eggs in Northern Tyrol is not yet a proof of the establishment of a self-sustaining population, although it indicates the ongoing introduction of this species along main traffic routes from Italy, where this mosquito is well established. The risk of establishment of the tiger mosquito in the Lower Inn Valley is therefore a given and informing the public about preventive measures to hinder and delay this development is highly recommended.

Monitoring of alien mosquitoes in Western Austria (Tyrol, Austria, 2018)

“…Ovitraps are widely used for surveillance of alien and invasive Aedes species as described elsewhere (e.g. [36]), and the same technique was used for the monitoring in 2017 [37]. Two conical black 500-ml cups filled with approximately 400 ml of water were set up per site.…”

“…After homogenisation of eggs in a TissueLyser II (Qiagen, Germany) with two ceramic beads (2.8 mm Precellys Ceramic Beads, VWR, Germany) as described previously [37], DNA was isolated using the Qiagen DNeasy Blood&Tissue kit (Qiagen, Germany) according to the manufacturer's instructions. To identify insect species, barcoding was performed within the mitochondrial cytochrome oxidase subunit I (mt COI) gene using the primers LepF1 and LepR1 [38].…”

A yellow flag on the horizon: The looming threat of yellow fever to North America

“…albopictus is widespread in the South Central, South East, and Mid-Atlantic States, as well as in California and Arizona (Hahn et al, 2017). In Europe, its current distribution includes the countries in the Mediterranean, the Adriatic, the Eastern Black Sea coasts (Javelle et al, 2018), Eastern France, Switzerland and Southwestern Germany and introductions of the vector into other countries like Austria, Belgium or the Netherlands are frequent (Scholte et al, 2008;ECDC, 2019;Schoener et al, 2019), Moreover, it has already been responsible for recent, important arboviral outbreaks in Europe (vide supra).…”

Identification of Aedes mosquitoes by MALDI-TOF MS biotyping using protein signatures from larval and pupal exuviae

“…Mosquitoes (Diptera: Culicidae) are the common vectors of many infectious diseases distributed throughout the world [1]. Globalization has increased transport of goods and people between continents, and at the same time contributed to the global expansion of some invasive mosquito species [2]. Moreover, global warming facilitated the colonization of new areas by mosquitoes participating to the rapid change of the mosquito-borne diseases (MBDs) epidemiology [3,4].…”

“…atropalpus were reported as highly invasive species in Europe and are competent vectors for numerous human and animal pathogens [8]. These aedine species invaded several European countries like Switzerland [9], Germany [10], Austria [2], France [11] and Italy [12]. The establishment of these Aedes species in Europe participated to the emergence of autochthonous human cases of dengue and chikungunya [13,14].…”