Studies of the Sand Fly Vector

项目2“沙蝇向量的研究”将挑战一些教条的指导电流向量和 内脏利什曼病(VL)疾病控制工作。 白纹伊蚊，杜氏利什曼原虫的沙蝇媒介，被认为是一种糟糕的飞虫 主要在室内繁殖和休息，午夜前后叮咬；病媒控制工作计划基于 关于沙蝇数量季节性的假设。这项研究的第一个目的是提供一个 准确描述媒介丰度、取食偏好、叮咬时间和蚊子数量的季节变化 估计感染杜氏钩端螺旋体的媒介比例的季节变化。为了能够瞄准 这项研究不仅包括成年沙蝇，也包括早期阶段的沙蝇，研究还包括一个旨在 银杏繁殖地的鉴定。 室内喷洒残留杀虫剂(IRS)是防治紫云英天牛的主要方法。 在TMRC研究的较早阶段，印度次大陆被证明是严重不足的。在这 将通过定性和定量研究来调查IRS覆盖率低的项目原因。在……里面 此外，还将开发一种沙蝇唾液抗体测试，这一测试有望提供一种直接衡量 在个人水平上的媒介暴露。这种新的方法可以用来监测 病媒控制工作，消除了昂贵和繁琐的病媒丰度研究的需要。 该项目将挑战的另一个假设是，只有有症状的患者和患者 在黑热病后，皮肤利什曼病(PKDL)可感染沙蝇媒介。VL的数量 目前TMRC研究领域的病例如此之少，以至于从数学上看，它们似乎不太可能持续下去 传播；然而，无症状感染者的数量要高得多。该项目将 通过靶向异种诊断研究无症状感染者对沙蝇的感染性 实验。

Project 2 "Studies of the sand fly vector" will challenge some of the dogma's guiding current vector and diseases control efforts for Visceral Leishmaniasis (VL). Phlebotomus argentipes, the sand fly vector of Leishmania donovani, is assumed to be a poor flyer that breeds and rests mainly indoor and bites around midnight; vector control efforts are planned based on assumptions about the seasonality of sand fly abundance. The first aim of this study is to provide an accurate description of seasonal variation in vector abundance, feeding preferences, biting times and an estimate of the seasonal variation in the proportion of vectors infected with L. donovani. To be able to target not just the adult sand flies but also the earlier stages, the study also includes a component aimed at identifying breeding sites of P. argentipes. Coverage with indoor residual insecticide spraying (IRS), the main P. argentipes control method on the Indian subcontinent, was shown to be grossly inadequate in an eartier phase of the TMRC study. In this project reasons for low IRS coverage will be investigated through qualitative and quantitative research. In addition a sand fly saliva antibody test will be developed, this test is expected to provide a direct measure of vector exposure at the level of the individual. This new method can be used to monitor the effectiveness of vector control efforts, obviating the need of costly and cumbersome vector abundance studies. Another assumption this project will challenge is the assumption that only symptomatic patients and patients with post Kala Azar dermal Leishmaniasis (PKDL) are infectious to the sand fly vector. The number of VL cases in the current TMRC study area is so low that mathematically it seems unlikely they can sustain transmission; the number of asymptomatically infected persons however is much higher. The project will study the infectivity of asymptomatically infected persons to sand flies by conducting targeted xenodiagnosis experiments.