Stage Master

Vector-borne diseases are on the rise worldwide with a particular concern over viruses transmitted by Aedes mosquitoes such as Dengue, Zika, Chykungunya and Yellow fever viruses. In the absence of efficient treatments or vaccines for these viral infections, strategies that target mosquito vectors are an alternative to block disease transmission.

Our laboratory has been interested in characterizing natural mechanisms that mediate antiviral resistance in Aedes aegypti mosquitoes. Mosquito antiviral defenses could be exploited to prevent virus infection thus blocking the transmission cycle. We have observed that virus resistant and susceptible mosquitoes co-exist in the same population. Although this dichotomy is broadly observed, the percentages of resistance varies in different mosquito populations. Differences between resistant and susceptible individuals could provide the basis to understand how arboviruses are controlled by the mosquito immune system.

We will apply high-throughput RNA sequencing to characterize the transcriptome of individual mosquitoes that are either resistant and susceptible to Zika virus. We will process and analyze the data utilizing various bioinformatics tools to identify genes expression, single nucleotide polymorphism, deletions and insertions that are differentially represented in resistant and susceptible mosquitoes. We will also apply a systems biology approach to identify biological processes associated with each phenotype. The data generated will be used to create hypotheses that may explain mosquito resistance to Zika virus. These will be tested in laboratory conditions.

Whilst contributing to characterize antiviral resistance in Aedes aegypti mosquitoes, the candidate will gain competences in bioinformatic tools such as analysis of high-throughput RNA sequencing, differential gene expression, basic systems biology as well as many tools for data visualization.