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Dryad

Mosquito heat seeking is driven by an ancestral cooling receptor

Garrity, Paul1

Published Apr 26, 2021 on Dryad. https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.pzgmsbcg3

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Apr 26, 2021 version files 1.08 GB

Abstract

Mosquitoes transmit pathogens that kill >700,000 people annually. These insects use body heat to locate and feed on warm-blooded hosts, but the molecular basis of such behavior is unknown. Here, we identify ionotropic receptor IR21a, a receptor conserved throughout insects, as a key mediator of heat seeking in the malaria vector Anopheles gambiae. Although Ir21a mediates heat avoidance in Drosophila, we find it drives heat seeking and heat-stimulated blood feeding in Anopheles. At a cellular level, Ir21a is essential for the detection of cooling, suggesting that during evolution mosquito heat seeking relied on cooling-mediated repulsion. Our data indicate that the evolution of blood feeding in Anopheles involves repurposing an ancestral thermoreceptor from non–blood-feeding Diptera.