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 Mar 24:12:330.
doi: 10.12688/f1000research.130734.1. eCollection 2023.

The first genome sequence of Anopheles squamous from Macha, Zambia

Valerie T Nguyen  1 , Travis C Collier  2 , Sangwoo Seok  1 , Xiaodi Wang  1 , Monicah M Mburu  3 , Limonty Simubali  3 , Mary E Gebhardt  4 , Douglas E Norris  4 , Yoosook Lee  1
Affiliations

The first genome sequence of Anopheles squamous from Macha, Zambia

Valerie T Nguyen et al. F1000Res. .

Abstract

Despite efforts to minimize the impacts of malaria and reduce the number of primary vectors, malaria has yet to be eliminated in Zambia. Understudied vector species may perpetuate malaria transmission in pre-elimination settings. Anopheles squamosus is one of the most abundantly caught mosquito species in southern Zambia and has previously been found with Plasmodium falciparum sporozoites, a causal agent of human malaria. This species may be a critical vector of malaria transmission, however, there is a lack of genetic information available for An. squamosus. We report the first genome data and the first complete mitogenome (Mt) sequence of An. squamosus. The sequence was extracted from one individual mosquito from the Chidakwa area in Macha, Zambia. The raw reads were obtained using Illumina Novaseq 6000 and assembled through NOVOplasty alignment with related species. The length of the An. squamosus Mt was 15,351 bp, with 77.9 % AT content. The closest match to the whole mitochondrial genome in the phylogenetic tree is the African malaria mosquito, Anopheles gambiae. Its genome data is available through National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI) Sequencing Reads Archive (SRA) with accession number SRR22114392. The mitochondrial genome was deposited in NCBI GenBank with the accession number OP776919. The ITS2 containing contig sequence was deposited in GenBank with the accession number OQ241725. Mitogenome annotation and a phylogenetic tree with related Anopheles mosquito species are provided.

Keywords: Africa; Anopheles squamosus; Zambia; understudied malaria vector.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

No competing interests were disclosed.

Figures

Figure 1.
Figure 1.. A: Anopheles squamosus image. B: An. squamosus wing. C: Head image of An. squamosus, one of the features used for species identification.
A and B have been reproduced with permission from Dr. Rebekah Kading (Colorado State University). C has been reproduced with permission from Walter Reed Biosystematics Unit (WRBU).
Figure 2.
Figure 2.. Mitogenome map of An. squamosus including annotated genes.
Figure 3.
Figure 3.. Phylogenetic tree based on mitogenome sequences of An. squamosus and its related mosquitoes.
Species names are provided next to the GenBank accession numbers. Numbers at nodes indicate bootstrap values out of 100 replicates. Aedes aegypti was considered as an outgroup. The scale bar indicates relative nucleotide difference (0.02=2% nucleotide difference).
See this image and copyright information in PMC

References

    1. Theobald FV: A monograph of the Culicidae, or mosquitoes. London: British museum (Nat. hist.). Department of Zoology;1901;256.
    1. Stevenson JC, Simubali L, Mbambara S, et al. : Detection of Plasmodium falciparum Infection in Anopheles squamosus (Diptera: Culicidae) in an Area Targeted for Malaria Elimination, Southern Zambia. J. Med. Entomol. 2016 Nov;53(6):1482–1487. 10.1093/jme/tjw091 - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Hoffman JE, Ciubotariu SL, Mudenda T, et al. : Phylogenetic Complexity of Morphologically Identified Anopheles squamosus in Southern Zambia. Insects. 2021 Feb 8;12(2). 10.3390/insects12020146 - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Fornadel CM, Norris LC, Franco V, et al. : Unexpected anthropophily in the potential secondary malaria vectors Anopheles coustani s.l. and Anopheles squamosus in Macha, Zambia. Vector Borne Zoonotic Dis. 2011 Aug;11(8):1173–1179. 10.1089/vbz.2010.0082 - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Stevenson JC, Norris DE: Implicating cryptic and novel anophelines as malaria vectors in Africa. Insects. 2017;8(1):1–18. - PMC - PubMed