Browsing by Author "Athumani, Yahya"

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    Population decline in anopheles gambiae complex mosquitoes and its impact in transmission of malaria and filarriasis in Tanga, Tanzania.
    (University of Dar es Salaam, 2013) Athumani, Yahya
    The decline in malaria and lymphatic filariasis (LF) transmission in Tanga, Tanzania has been reported to coincide with decrease in malaria vector density, particularly the Anopheles gambiae complex. The decrease in vector may have contributed to the reduction in transmission, thus the objective of this study was to determine the possible changes in composition of sibling species of An. gambiae complex and establish their role in transmission of malaria and LF. The an. gambiae complex mosquitoes were collected in 4 villages of Tanga using light traps and identified to sibling species using poliymerase chain reaction (PCR) of the intergenic spacers region of the ribosomal deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA). To the same mosquito specimens, the presence of infection with plasmodium falciparum and wuchereria bancrofti was detected by PCR on P. falciparum small sub-unit ribosomal ribonucleic acid (RNA) genes and highly repeated DNA sequence found in W. bancrofti (the Sspl repeat), respectively. Findings indicated that, An. gambiae sensu strict (s.s), An. Merus and An. arabiensis were the sibling species of the An. gambiae complex found in the study area. Furthermore, it was found out that there has been a change in sibling species composition from predominantly An. gambiae s.s in the past to An. arabiensis. Prevalence P. falciparum infection in examined mosquitoes was 0.2% and detected only in An. arabiensis, while that of W. bancrofti infection was 3.6% and detected in all three sibling species. It is concluded that the decline in population of An. gambiae complex has disproportionately affected the An. gambiae s.s., reducing its role in the transmission of malaria and LF in the study areas.