Experimental transmission of a microsporidian pathogen from mosquitoes to an alternate copepod host

Meiospores of a microsporidian parasite Amblyospora sp. (Protozoa: Microspora) from larval Aedes cantator mosquitoes were directly infectious to an alternate copepod host, Acanthocyclops vernalis (Arthropoda: Crustacea). Infections ranged from 6.7% to 60.0% in laboratory tests when meiospores and copepods were maintained together for 10-30 days in filtered water from the breeding site or in a balanced salt solution. Pathogen development takes place within host adipose tissue and is fatal to the copepod. The entire developmental sequence of this microsporidian in the copepod is unikaryotic and there is no ultrastructural evidence of a sexual cycle or a restoration of the diploid condition in the alternate host. Single uninucleated spores similar to those previously described for the genus Pyrotheca are formed. Results demonstrate that haploid meiospores of Amblyospora from mosquitoes have the function of transmitting the pathogen to another host and that members of this genus are polymorphic and have at least three distinct developmental cycles, each producing a different spore.