RT Journal Article
SR Electronic
T1 Synergistic Coding of Carbon Dioxide and a Human Sweat Odorant in the Mosquito Brain
JF bioRxiv
FD Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory
SP 2020.11.02.365916
DO 10.1101/2020.11.02.365916
A1 Shruti Shankar
A1 Genevieve M. Tauxe
A1 Emma D. Spikol
A1 Ming Li
A1 Omar S. Akbari
A1 Diego Giraldo
A1 Conor J. McMeniman
YR 2021
UL http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2021/11/03/2020.11.02.365916.abstract
AB The yellow fever mosquito Aedes aegypti employs olfaction to locate humans. We applied neural activity mapping to define the molecular and cellular logic of how the mosquito brain is wired to detect two human odorants that are attractive when blended together. We determined that the human breath volatile carbon dioxide (CO2) is detected by the largest unit of olfactory coding in the antennal lobe of the mosquito brain. Synergistically, CO2 detection gates pre-synaptic calcium signaling in olfactory sensory neuron axon terminals that innervate unique antennal lobe regions tuned to the human sweat odorant L-(+)-lactic acid. We propose that simultaneous detection of the signature human volatiles CO2 and L-(+)-lactic acid disinhibits a multimodal olfactory network for hunting humans in the mosquito brain.Competing Interest StatementThe authors have declared no competing interest.