title: Meteorological variables and mosquito monitoring are good predictors for infestation trends of Aedes aegypti, the vector of dengue, chikungunya and Zika.
abstract: Aedes aegypti is an important vector for arboviroses and widely distributed throughout the world. Climatic factors can influence vector population dynamics and, consequently, disease transmission. The aim of this study was to characterize the temporal dynamics of an Ae. aegypti population and dengue cases and to investigate the relationship between meteorological variables and mosquito infestation.
  
  
  
  We monitored and analyzed the adult female Ae. aegypti population, the dengue-fever vector, in Porto Alegre, a subtropical city in Brazil using the MI-Dengue system (intelligent dengue monitoring). This system uses sticky traps to monitor weekly infestation indices. We fitted generalized additive models (GAM) with climate variables including precipitation, temperature and humidity, and a GAM that additionally included mosquito abundance in the previous week as an explanatory variable. Logistic regression was used to evaluate the effect of adult mosquito infestation on the probability of dengue occurrence.
  
  
  
  Adult mosquito abundance was strongly seasonal, with low infestation indices during the winters and high infestation during the summers. Weekly minimum temperatures above 18 °C were strongly associated with increased mosquito abundance, whereas humidity above 75% had a negative effect on abundance. The GAM model that included adult mosquito infestation in the previous week adjusted and predicted the observed data much better than the model which included only meteorological predictor variables. Dengue was also seasonal and 98% of all cases occurred at times of high adult Ae. aegypti infestation. The probability of dengue occurrence increased by 25%, when the mean number of adult mosquitos caught by monitoring traps increased by 0.1 mosquitoes per week.
  
  
  
  The results suggest that continuous monitoring of dengue vector population allows for more reliable predictions of infestation indices. The adult mosquito infestation index was a good predictor of dengue occurrence. Weekly adult dengue vector monitoring is a helpful dengue control strategy in subtropical Brazilian cities.
authors.affiliation: Departamento de Parasitologia, Instituto de Ciências Biológicas, Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais, Belo Horizonte, Brazil. danielleandreza3@gmail.com.
authors.forename: Danielle Andreza
authors.initials: DA
authors.lastname: da Cruz Ferreira
authors.affiliation: Programa de Computação Científica, Fiocruz, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.
authors.forename: Carolin Marlen
authors.initials: CM
authors.lastname: Degener
authors.affiliation: Ecovec Ltda., Parque Tecnológico de Belo Horizonte (BHTec) Belo Horizonte, Belo Horizonte, Brazil.|Departamento de Bioquímica e Imunologia, ICB, Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais, Belo Horizonte, Brazil.
authors.forename: Cecilia
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: de Almeida Marques-Toledo
authors.affiliation: Vigilância de Roedores e Vetores, CGVS/SMS, Porto Alegre, Brazil.
authors.forename: Maria Mercedes
authors.initials: MM
authors.lastname: Bendati
authors.affiliation: Vigilância de Roedores e Vetores, CGVS/SMS, Porto Alegre, Brazil.
authors.forename: Liane Oliveira
authors.initials: LO
authors.lastname: Fetzer
authors.affiliation: UNIFEMM, Sete Lagoas, Brazil.
authors.forename: Camila P
authors.initials: CP
authors.lastname: Teixeira
authors.affiliation: Departamento de Parasitologia, Instituto de Ciências Biológicas, Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais, Belo Horizonte, Brazil.
authors.forename: Álvaro Eduardo
authors.initials: ÁE
authors.lastname: Eiras
mesh_terms: D000330:Aedes / Q000254:growth & development*; D000818:Animals; D001938:Brazil / Q000453:epidemiology; D002947:Cities / Q000453:epidemiology; D003715:Dengue / Q000453:epidemiology* / Q000635:transmission*; D008685:Meteorological Concepts; D000072138:Mosquito Vectors; D011156:Population Density
keywords: Aedes aegypti; Dengue; MosquiTRAP; Surveillance