Circadian responses of the kissing bug Triatoma infestans to nocturnal and diurnal vertebrate hosts

PABLO LOPEZ; LUCIANA ABRAHAN; VERONICA VALENTINUZZI; MARTIN RALPH

Valparaíso

Simposio; XIV Latin American Symposium on Chronobiology; 2017

Insects express diverse behavioral rhythms synchronized to environmental cycles. Whereas circadian entrainment to light-dark cycles is ubiquitous in living organisms, entrainment by non-photic cycles is critical for hematophagous bugs that depend on rhythmic hosts. T. infestans feed on vertebrates with different temporal patterns during each host?s quiescent time. This implies that synchronization with the host?s behavior is important for the insects? survival. Kissing bugs were housed in a compartment in constant dark, air-flow-connected to another compartment with a nocturnal rodent or a diurnal bird synchronized to a light-dark cycle. The activity rhythms of kissing bugs were modulated by the daily rhythms of the hosts. The effects were concentration of activity during the hosts ?sleep phase, relative coordination and decrease of endogenous period. Splitting and bimodality were additionally observed and also affected by the host presence. T. infestans were able to differentiate the active and inactive phases of their potential hosts, an ability that surely facilitates feeding and hinders predation risk.