title: Establishment and characterization of two new cell lines from the mosquito Armigeres subalbatus (Coquillett) (Diptera: Culicidae).
abstract: Armigeres subalbatus (Coquillett) is a medically important mosquito and a model species for immunology research. We successfully established two cell lines from the neonate larvae of A. subalbatus using two different media. To our knowledge, this is the first report of an established Armigeres mosquito cell line. The cell lines, designated as Ar-3 and Ar-13, consist of adherent and diploid cells with compact colonies. Both these cell lines grow slowly after passage at a split ratio of 1:5 and a population doubling time of 2.7 and 3.0 d, respectively. Random amplified polymorphic DNA polymerase chain reaction (RAPD-PCR) was used to confirm that these lines correspond to the species of origin and are clearly distinct from seven other insect cell lines. Furthermore, reverse-transcription PCR was used to demonstrate that the Ar-3 cell line is susceptible to the Japanese encephalitis virus and two insect flaviviruses associated with Culex and Aedes mosquitoes but relatively insensitive to dengue virus. These data indicate that the newly established cell lines are cellular models of A. subalbatus as well as beneficial tools for the propagation of viruses associated with the Armigeres mosquito.
authors.affiliation: Department of Medical Entomology, National Institute of Infectious Diseases, 1-23-1 Toyama, Shinjuku-ku, Tokyo, 162-8640, Japan.
authors.forename: Keita
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Hoshino
authors.forename: Haruhiko
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Isawa
authors.forename: Ryusei
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Kuwata
authors.forename: Shigeru
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Tajima
authors.forename: Tomohiko
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Takasaki
authors.forename: Kikuo
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Iwabuchi
authors.forename: Kyoko
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Sawabe
authors.forename: Mutsuo
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Kobayashi
authors.forename: Toshinori
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Sasaki
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D002460:Cell Line / Q000821:virology*; D009033:Culicidae / Q000166:cytology* / Q000235:genetics / Q000821:virology*; D003716:Dengue Virus / Q000472:pathogenicity; D004664:Encephalitis Virus, Japanese / Q000472:pathogenicity; D005260:Female; D005416:Flavivirus / Q000472:pathogenicity; D007814:Larva / Q000166:cytology; D061251:Primary Cell Culture / Q000379:methods; D019105:Random Amplified Polymorphic DNA Technique; D020133:Reverse Transcriptase Polymerase Chain Reaction