Publications by authors named "Xiao-guang Chen"

Background: Mosquitoes with aggressive biting behavior are important disease vectors threatening public health. Armigeres subalbatus, as an emerging arbovirus and filarial disease vector, exhibits aggressive host-seeking behavior and unique breeding preference for contaminated water. However, the molecular mechanisms underlying these biological characteristics remain poorly understood.

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The monitoring and identification of mosquito vectors are crucial for controlling the transmission of mosquito-borne diseases. Traditional mosquito morphological identification and surveillance methods, such as human landing catches, human-baited double net traps and BG-Sentinel mosquito traps, require a large amount of manpower but can only provide fragmented data. We utilized the MS-300, an internet-based vector mosquito monitor, to continuously capture and upload real-time data to cloud services across ten monitoring sites located in seven cities in Zhejiang Province, China from May to December 2023.

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The mirtron pathway represents a distinct category of noncanonical microRNA (miRNA) biogenesis mechanisms. Current studies suggest that the mirtron pathway may be widely prevalent across various taxa, including animals and plants, but investigation of this pathway has focused mainly on mammals, particularly humans, and the biological functions and emerging roles of several mirtrons in human diseases have been elucidated. In the context of insects, mirtrons have only been comprehensively characterized and preliminarily functionally analyzed in Drosophila.

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Background: Oviposition site selection is an important component of vector mosquito reproductive biology. The Asian Tiger mosquito, Aedes albopictus, is a major and important vector of arboviruses including Dengue. Previous studies documented the preference of gravid females for small, dark-colored water containers as oviposition sites, which they sought during the twilight period (dusk) of their locomotor activity.

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Abnormal differentiation of cells is a hallmark of malignancy. Induction of cancer-cell differentiation is emerging as a novel therapeutic strategy with low toxicity in hematological malignances, but whether such treatment can be used in solid tumors is not known. Here, we uncovered a novel function of acetyl coenzyme A acetyltransferase (ACAT1) in regulating the differentiation of glioblastoma (GBM) cells.

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Article Synopsis
  • Aedes albopictus mosquitoes use olfactory, visual, and gustatory cues to find and select stagnant water sites for laying eggs, but the taste mechanism remains unclear.
  • The study employed a laboratory model to analyze the mosquitoes' behavior in search of these sites by manipulating taste organs and comparing their detection efficiency.
  • Results indicated that a specific taste-related gene (gr11) affects water detection time, with mutations in this gene leading to longer detection times, highlighting its significance in oviposition site selection.
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Cisplatin is a widely used drug for the clinical treatment of tumors. However, nephrotoxicity limits its widespread use. A series of compounds including eight analogs () and 40 simplifiers () were synthesized based on the total synthesis of Psiguamer A and B, which were novel meroterpenoids with unusual skeletons from the leaves of .

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Aedes albopictus is an important vector of arboviruses and prefers small containers of stagnant water as oviposition sites. One of the mechanisms mosquitoes use to search for suitable oviposition sites is relying on odor cues from prospective sites and their surroundings. The genetic and molecular bases of this behavior are not known for Ae.

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Background: Vector mosquito control is important for preventing and controlling mosquito-borne infectious diseases. This study designed and developed a mosquito killer (MK) with a specific light wavelength, simulated human body temperature, human odor, and a photocatalyst to stimulate CO based on the physiological characteristics and ecological habits of mosquitoes. We tested the trapping effect of individual and multiple mosquito-trapping elements of the MK through two-way selection experiments and compared them with several commercial mosquito traps.

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Article Synopsis
  • - The study investigates the spread and genetic factors of the dengue virus (DENV-1) in Guangdong, China, from 1990 to 2019, highlighting its challenges to public health due to frequent imports causing outbreaks.
  • - Researchers analyzed 179 genomes from local dengue cases along with over 5,000 complete sequences, revealing complex transmission patterns and the presence of multiple dengue serotypes in the region, particularly Guangdong and Yunnan provinces.
  • - Key findings include the identification of 189 transmission clusters with specific clades responsible for major outbreaks and a periodicity of approximately 3 years, with Guangzhou emerging as a critical hub for DENV-1 transmission across China.
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The vast majority of all global species have circadian rhythm cycles that allow them to adapt to natural environments. These regular rhythms are regulated by core clock genes and recent studies have also implicated roles for microRNAs in this regulation. Oviposition is an important circadian behavior in the reproductive cycle of insect vectors of diseases, and little is known about the rhythm or its regulation in mosquitoes.

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Background: More than half of the global population lives in areas at risk of dengue (DENV) transmission. Developing an efficient risk prediction system can help curb dengue outbreaks, but multiple variables, including mosquito-based surveillance indicators, still constrain our understanding. Mosquito or oviposition positive index (MOI) has been utilized in field surveillance to monitor the wild population density of Aedes albopictus in Guangzhou since 2005.

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Background: Aedes albopictus is an invasive vector of serious Aedes-borne diseases of global concern. Habitat management remains a critical factor for establishing a cost-effective systematic strategy for sustainable vector control. However, the community-based characteristics of Ae.

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Background: Worldwide invasion and expansion of Aedes albopictus, an important vector of dengue, chikungunya, and Zika viruses, has become a serious concern in global public health. Chemical insecticides are the primary means currently available to control the mosquito populations. However, long-term and large-scale use of insecticides has selected for resistance in the mosquito that is accompanied by a genetic load that impacts fitness.

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Signal transducer and activator of transcription 3 (STAT3) is an attractive target for cancer therapy. However, identifying potent and selective STAT3 small-molecule inhibitors with drug-like properties remains challenging. Based on a scaffold combination strategy, compounds with a novel -(benzimidazol-5-yl)-1,3,4-thiadiazol-2-amine scaffold were designed and their inhibition of the interleukin-6 (IL-6)/JAK/STAT3 pathway was tested in HEK-Blue IL-6 reporter cells.

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Background: Chlorogenic acid (CHA) has been shown to have substantial biological activities, including anti-inflammatory, antioxidant, and antitumor effects. However, the pharmacological role of CHA in neuroblastoma has not yet been assessed. Neuroblastoma is a type of cancer that develops in undifferentiated sympathetic ganglion cells.

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Introduction: is an aggressive invasive mosquito species widely distributed around the world, and it is also a known vector of arboviruses. Virus metagenomics and RNA interference (RNAi) are important in studying the biology and antiviral defense of . However, the virome and potential transmission of plant viruses by remain understudied.

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Article Synopsis
  • Dengue virus (DENV) poses a significant public health risk in Guangzhou, China, with Aedes albopictus acting as the main mosquito vector, while mosquito densoviruses (MDVs) were previously isolated from these mosquitoes in the region.
  • The study utilized sequencing data and PCR detection to assess MDV prevalence in wild Ae. albopictus and aimed to explore how MDVs affect DENV susceptibility, using various methods to measure viral infection rates over time.
  • Findings showed a high prevalence of MDVs in multiple mosquito species and demonstrated that MDV superinfection decreased DENV-2 titers in mosquito tissues, indicating potential interactions between MDVs and DENV that could influence dengue transmission dynamics.
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The initial signals governing sex determination vary widely among insects. Here we show that Armigeres subalbatus M factor (AsuMf), a male-specific duplication of an autosomal gene of the Drosophila behaviour/human splicing (DBHS) gene family, is the potential primary signal for sex determination in the human filariasis vector mosquito, Ar. subalbatus.

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Background: Endogenous circadian rhythms result from genetically-encoded molecular clocks, whose components and downstream output factors cooperate to generate cyclic changes in activity. Mating is an important activity of mosquitoes, however, the key aspects of mating rhythm patterns and their regulatory mechanisms in two vector mosquito species, Aedes albopictus and Culex quinquefasciatus, remain unclear.

Methodology/principal Findings: We determined and compared the diel mating activity rhythms of these two mosquito species and discovered that Ae.

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Background: Aedes albopictus is a public health threat for its worldwide spread and ability to transmit arboviruses. Understanding mechanisms of mosquito immunity can provide new tools to control arbovirus spread. The genomes of Aedes mosquitoes contain hundreds of nonretroviral endogenous viral elements (nrEVEs), which are enriched in piRNA clusters and produce piRNAs, with the potential to target cognate viruses.

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Background: Dengue is the fastest spreading arboviral disease, posing great challenges on global public health. A reproduceable and comparable global genotyping framework for contextualizing spatiotemporal epidemiological data of dengue virus (DENV) is essential for research studies and collaborative surveillance.

Methods: Targeting DENV-1 spreading prominently in recent decades, by reconciling all qualified complete E gene sequences of 5003 DENV-1 strains with epidemiological information from 78 epidemic countries/areas ranging from 1944 to 2018, we established and characterized a unified global high-resolution genotyping framework using phylogenetics, population genetics, phylogeography, and phylodynamics.

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Article Synopsis
  • The study developed an internet-based mosquito monitor, MS-300, to track and capture vector mosquitoes crucial for controlling mosquito-borne diseases.
  • In laboratory and field tests, MS-300 demonstrated high efficiency rates of 98.5% for Aedes albopictus and 99.3% for Culex quinquefasciatus, significantly improving capture rates when baited.
  • Real-time data collected indicated distinct activity patterns of the mosquitoes and highlighted a strong link between mosquito captures and environmental temperature, supporting MS-300's effectiveness in monitoring these species.
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Article Synopsis
  • Aedes albopictus is a highly invasive mosquito species that spreads important viruses, with the AalNix gene identified as the male-determining factor.
  • Research developed transgenic lines expressing different AalNix isoforms, revealing that one isoform can convert females into fertile males (pseudo-males) that resemble wild-type males.
  • The findings enhance our understanding of sex determination in Ae. albopictus and support strategies for controlling its population by focusing on male-only releases.
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