The Arthropod Vector: The Controller of Transmission

Keystone Symposia, Silverthorne CO

Investigators

Abstract

? DESCRIPTION (provided by the applicant): Support is requested for a Keystone Symposia meeting entitled The Arthropod Vector: The Controller of Transmission, organized by Serap Aksoy, Stephen K. Wikel and David S. Schneider. The meeting will be held in Taos, New Mexico from May 12-17, 2015. A wide variety of pathogens are transmitted by arthropod vectors in the course of a blood meal resulting in some of the world's most important infectious diseases, such as malaria, dengue, leishmaniasis, Chagas Disease and the newly emerging chikungunya. These diseases impose a disproportionate economic burden on developing countries. However, most research on the prevention of transmission of the pathogens that cause them has focused on the mammalian immune response to the pathogens, ignoring the contribution of the biting arthropod vector. The Keystone Symposia meeting on The Arthropod Vector will review the breadth and depth of current hot topics in vector biology. Vector innate immunity studies have been ongoing for about a decade and this field has matured and helped our understanding of the complex interactions between pathogens and vectors. The vector microbiome represents a novel, nascent area of research with great promise for the development of novel prevention and control approaches. With its focus on vector-borne diseases, the meeting will synergize with the NIAID mission by bringing together scientists working in different molecular and cellular aspects of both invertebrate and vertebrate host-pathogen interactions, with the aim of developing new partnerships and strategies to control vector-borne infectious diseases.