Reduced access to atmospheric oxygen greatly increased early instar Aedes aegypti mortality. Data suggest that death was by drowning mainly because slow swimming speed and low visual acuity delayed larvae from finding access to air. Late instar larvae experienced developmental delays when food depletion in the immediate vicinity of the breathing site forced them to forage farther away. As the distance between feeding and breathing sites increased, feeding efficiency of fourth instars may have declined enough to reduce their pupation success and to cause increased pupal mortality, reduced adult emergence and sex ratio skewed in favour of males among emerging functional adults. Thus reduced access to atmospheric oxygen at the pre-imago level may reduce the vectorial capacity of emerging adult population.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:LACETR/oai:collectionscanada.gc.ca:QMM.80246 |
| Date | January 2003 |
| Creators | Cyr, Hélène |
| Contributors | Rau, Manfred E. (advisor) |
| Publisher | McGill University |
| Source Sets | Library and Archives Canada ETDs Repository / Centre d'archives des thèses électroniques de Bibliothèque et Archives Canada |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Electronic Thesis or Dissertation |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Coverage | Master of Science (Department of Natural Resource Sciences.) |
| Rights | All items in eScholarship@McGill are protected by copyright with all rights reserved unless otherwise indicated. |
| Relation | alephsysno: 002130872, proquestno: AAIMQ98615, Theses scanned by UMI/ProQuest. |
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