Culex perfuscus explained

Culex perfuscus is the only Culex species mosquito currently implicated as a possible vector of Zika virus.^[1] The species type was described in 1914 from Port Herald, Nyasaland by entomologist Frederick Wallace Edwards.^{[2] [3]} __TOC__

Bionomics

Culex perfuscus have been collected in a variety of sites in forest habitat, including springs containing green algae, foul pools, shaded residual pools, the bed of a temporary stream, the edge of a slow-flowing river, and water in the bottom of an old canoe.^[4]

Culex perfuscus occurs in Benin, Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Central African Republic, Cote d'Ivoire, Democratic Republic of the Congo (Zaire), Ethiopia, Gabon, Ghana, Kenya, Liberia, Madagascar (including Glorioso and Juan de Nova islands), Malawi, Mali, Mauritania, Mozambique, Nigeria, Senegal, Sierra Leone, South Africa, Sudan and South Sudan, and Uganda.^[2]

Medical importance

Zika virus has been detected in Culex perfuscus, although at a very low level, and no ability to transmit it was documented.^[1]

Notes and References

1. Diallo . D . Sall . AA . Diagne . CT . Faye . O . Faye . O . Ba . Y . Hanley . KA . Buenemann . M . Weaver . SC . Diallo . M . 2014 . Zika virus emergence in mosquitoes in southeastern Senegal, 2011 . PLOS ONE . 9 . 10. e109442 . 4195678 . 25310102 . 10.1371/journal.pone.0109442. 2014PLoSO...9j9442D . free .
2. Thomas V. Gaffigan, Richard C. Wilkerson, James E. Pecor, Judith A. Stoffer and Thomas Anderson. 2016. "Culex » Culex » perfuscus Edwards" in Systematic Catalog of Culicidae, Walter Reed Biosystematics Unit, http://www.mosquitocatalog.org/taxon_descr.aspx?ID=17002, accessed 21 Feb 2016.
3. Edwards, F. W. 1914. New African Culicidae in the British Museum, with Notes on the Genitalia of some African Culex. Bulletin of Entomological Research, V(1): 63-81; 71; http://www.cabdirect.org/abstracts/19141000168.html.
4. G. H. E. Hopkins. 1952. Mosquitoes of the Ethiopian Region I – Larval Bionomics of Mosquitoes and Taxonomy of Culicine Larvae, London: Bernard Quaritch. Second Edition. Pp. 324-326; http://www.mosquitocatalog.org/files/pdfs/062200-0.pdf .