Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2023 Sep;68(3):520-526.
doi: 10.1007/s11686-023-00690-1. Epub 2023 Jun 17.

Molecular Detection of Leishmania in Wild Caught Sand Flies of Larroussius Subgenus in Iran: Combined Use of Internal and External Morphological Characters as a Mean to Differentiate Morphologically Similar Females

Vahideh Moin Vaziri  1 , Hamed Behniafar  2 , Adel Spotin  3 , Azad Absavarand  4 , Mehdi Badakhshan  5
Affiliations

Molecular Detection of Leishmania in Wild Caught Sand Flies of Larroussius Subgenus in Iran: Combined Use of Internal and External Morphological Characters as a Mean to Differentiate Morphologically Similar Females

Vahideh Moin Vaziri et al. Acta Parasitol. 2023 Sep.

Abstract

Objective: Phlebotomine sand flies are the primary vectors of leishmaniasis; visceral form of disease is transmitted mainly by species belonging to Larroussius and Adlerius subgenus. Species identification of some females in Larroussius subgenus is not easy due to the high similarity. Accurate species identification enables control operations to target only main vectors and increase understanding of ecological needs, bionomic characteristics, and behavioral traits. The purpose of current study was to use two approaches based on internal and external morphological characters to identify the wild caught of female specimens belonged to Larroussius subgenus and investigate Leishmania infection.

Methods: Totally, 128 specimens belonging to Larroussius' subgenus were collected from a VL focus in northwestern Iran, species differentiation was done by two approaches proposed in literature: (1) characters of pharyngeal armature, number of Spermathecal segment, length of spermathecal neck, palpal and ascoid formulae; (2) blindly on the basis of the shape of the base of spermathecal duct. Their potential infection to Leishmania was investigated by kDNA-Nested-PCR.

Results: The results of species identification were consistent based on two methods. Among three identified species, Phlebotomus perfiliewi was found to be the dominant species, followed by Ph. neglectus and Ph. tobbi. Two specimens of Ph. perfiliewi were found to be infected by Leishmania infantum, which emphasizes the role of this species in VL transmission in study area.

Conclusion: It is suggested that combination of the characters used here be considered for species identification of female of Larroussius subgenus to take advantage of maximum characters, especially where species present sympatrically.

Keywords: Iran; Larroussius; Leishmania; Visceral leishmaniasis.

PubMed Disclaimer

References

    1. Absavaran A, Rassi Y, Parvizi P, Oshaghi M, Abaie M, Rafizadeh S, Mohebali M, Zarea Z, Javadian E (2009) Identification of sand flies of the subgenus Larroussius based on molecular and morphological characters in north western Iran. Iran J Arthropod Borne Dis 3(2):22–35 - PubMed - PMC
    1. Azizi K, Rassi Y, Javadian E, Motazedian MH, Asgari Q, Yaghoobi-Ershadi MR (2008) First detection of Leishmania infantum in Phlebotomus (Larroussius) major (Diptera: Psychodidae) from Iran. J Med Entomol 45(4):726–731. https://doi.org/10.1093/jmedent/45.4.726 - DOI - PubMed
    1. Badakhshan M, Moin-Vaziri V, Sadraei J (2022) Phlebotomus neglectus (Diptera: Psychodidae): new insights on its presence in Iran based on three independent genetic loci. J Med Entomol 59(1):233–239. https://doi.org/10.1093/jme/tjab159 - DOI - PubMed
    1. Badakhshan M, Sadraei J, Moin-Vaziri V (2011) Morphometric and morphological variation between two different populations of Phlebotomus major s.l. from endemic and non-endemic foci of visceral leishmaniasis in Iran. J Vector Ecol 36(1):153–158. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1948-7134.2011.00152.x - DOI - PubMed
    1. Bates PA (2007) Transmission of Leishmania metacyclic promastigotes by phlebotomine sand flies. Int J Parasitol 37(10):1097–1106. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijpara.2007.04.003 - DOI - PubMed - PMC

LinkOut - more resources