Of Genes and Genomes: Mosquito Evolution and Diversity

Abstract

Mosquitoes are widely despised for their exasperating buzzing and irritating bites, and more poignantly because, during blood-feeding, females may transmit pathogens that cause devastating diseases. However, the ability to transmit such viruses, filarial worms, or malaria parasites varies greatly amongst the ∼3500 recognised mosquito species. Applying omics technologies to sample this diversity and explore the biology underlying these variations is bringing increasingly greater resolution that enhances our understanding of mosquito evolution. Here we review the current status of mosquito omics, or 'mozomics', resources and recent advances in their applications to characterise mosquito biology and evolution, with a focus on the intersection of evolutionary and functional genomics to understand the putative links between gene and genome dynamism and mosquito diversity.

Keywords: comparative genomics; evolutionary dynamics; functional genomics; vector mosquitoes.