CONICET | Buscador de Institutos y Recursos Humanos

Diseases caused by flaviviruses are a major public health burden across the world. In the past decades, SouthAmerica has suffered dengue epidemics, the re-emergence of yellow fever and St. Louis encephalitis viruses,and the introduction of West Nile and Zika viruses. Many insect-specific flaviviruses (ISFs) that cannot replicatein vertebrate cells have recently been described. In this study, we analyzed field-collected mosquito samplesfrom six different ecoregions of Argentina to detect flaviviruses. We did not find any RNA belonging to pathogenic flaviviruses or ISFs in adults or immature stages. However, flaviviral-like DNA similar to flavivirus NS5region was detected in 83?100% of Aedes aegypti (L.). Despite being previously described as an ancient element in the Ae. aegypti genome, the flaviviral-like DNA sequence was not detected in all Ae. aegypti samplesand sequences obtained did not form a monophyletic group, possibly reflecting the genetic diversity of mosquito populations in Argentina.