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Kissing Bugs
Published in Jerome Goddard, Public Health Entomology, 2022
Kissing bugs are similar in appearance to assassin bugs (other members of the family Reduviidae) and may have orange and black markings where the abdomen extends laterally past the folded wings. The beak is short and three-segmented, and its tip fits into a groove in the venter of the thorax. In addition, the dorsal portion of the first segment of the thorax consists of a conspicuous triangular-shaped structure. Most adult kissing bugs are 1–3 cm long (Figure 17.3) and are good fliers.
Biting insect and tick allergens
Published in Richard F. Lockey, Dennis K. Ledford, Allergens and Allergen Immunotherapy, 2020
Donald R. Hoffman, Jennifer E. Fergeson
Bedbug infestations should be eliminated by treatment with appropriate pesticides, preferably by a licensed professional. Reduviid bugs are primarily outdoor insects and are best controlled by eliminating their definitive hosts around houses. Triatoma protracta comes from wood rat nests, but other species have varied hosts. Professional assistance is recommended.
Bugs (The True Bugs)
Published in Gail Miriam Moraru, Jerome Goddard, The Goddard Guide to Arthropods of Medical Importance, Seventh Edition, 2019
Gail Miriam Moraru, Jerome Goddard
Many members of the family Reduviidae have an elongate (cone-shaped) head, hence the name conenose bugs. Most reduviids “assassinate” or kill other insects. Some of the assassin bugs occasionally bite people, producing very painful lesions. A common offender is Melanolestes picipes. There is a report of two of these bugs biting an 8-year-old, causing intense pain for hours, swelling at the bite site for days, and, later, ulcers.59 A relatively small but important group of reduviids in the subfamily Triatominae feeds exclusively on vertebrate blood. Notorious members of this group are frequently in the genus Triatoma, but not all (see Figure 13.8 for a classification scheme of this group). Triatomines are called kissing bugs because their blood meals are occasionally taken from the area around the human lips (Figure 13.9). Other sites of human attack, in order of frequency, are the hands, arms, feet, head, and trunk. Kissing bugs are not able to feed through clothing. Very often, their bites are painless; however, reactions to their bites range from a single papule, to giant urticarial lesions, to anaphylaxis, depending on the degree of allergic sensitivity.60
Repurposing of rabeprazole as an anti-Trypanosoma cruzi drug that targets cellular triosephosphate isomerase
Published in Journal of Enzyme Inhibition and Medicinal Chemistry, 2023
Itzhel García-Torres, Ignacio De la Mora-De la Mora, Gabriel López-Velázquez, Nallely Cabrera, Luis Antonio Flores-López, Ingeborg Becker, Juliana Herrera-López, Roberto Hernández, Ruy Pérez-Montfort, Sergio Enríquez-Flores
Worldwide, CD causes approximately 12,000 deaths per year, with 6 to 7 million people infected, mainly in Latin America, and with a risk of 70 million people contracting it1. T. cruzi which parasitises more than 100 species of mammals, including humans, is the causative agent of CD. This organism has consistently developed in the tropical and subtropical regions of the American continent, leading to CD also known as American trypanosomiasis. It is primarily transmitted by the bite of haematophagous triatomine insects of the Reduviidae family. It is known that infection by T. cruzi is a complex zoonosis involving more than 100 species of hemipteran insects as well as more than 100 species of mammals3. Other transmission mechanisms have been reported, such as the oral route (food and water contaminated with triatomine excretions), blood transfusions, congenital transmission (mother to child), organ transplantation, laboratory accidents, and even sharing needles among drug users4,5. Non-vector-associated transmission mechanisms have facilitated the spread of CD with congenital transmission rates ranging from 2 to 12% in endemic countries6.
Insecticide potential of two saliva components of the predatory bug Podisus nigrispinus (Heteroptera: Pentatomidae) against Spodoptera frugiperda (Lepidoptera: Noctuidae) caterpillars
Published in Toxin Reviews, 2022
Juliana Mendonça Campos, Luis Carlos Martínez, Angelica Plata-Rueda, Wolfgang Weigand, José Cola Zanuncio, José Eduardo Serrão
Prey death associated with extra-oral digestion has been reported for the predatory heteropterans Belostoma anurum Herrich-Schäffer (Belostomatidae), Podisus maculiventris Say (Pentatomidae), and Rhynocoris marginatus Fabricius (Reduviidae) (Bell et al. 2005, Silva-Cardoso et al. 2010, Sahayaraj and Muthukumar 2011). Extra-oral digestion begins with the injection of saliva, which contains proteins that break down prey tissues and facilitate their ingestion (Cohen 1998, Fialho et al. 2012, Martínez et al. 2014, 2015). The presence of proteins (of hydrolyzing enzymes) such as amino-peptidase, amylase, cathepsin, chymotrypsin, α-glucosidase, lipase, phospholipase, and trypsin in the saliva has been found but collagenase act on the collagen present in intercellular space, contributes to toxic degradation and liquefaction of prey’s tissues (Fialho et al. 2012). During feeding, predatory bugs insert the stylet into the prey body and release saliva, leading to prey paralysis and death (Schmidt 1982, Cohen 1998, Martínez et al. 2016), which suggest that some components in the saliva of heteropteran are venoms toxic for preys (Martínez et al. 2016, Walker et al. 2016).
Why hasn’t there been more progress in new Chagas disease drug discovery?
Published in Expert Opinion on Drug Discovery, 2020
Alane Beatriz Vermelho, Giseli Capaci Rodrigues, Claudiu T. Supuran
CD is a complex zoonosis, transmitted by more than 100 species of insects of the Hemiptera order, belonging to the subfamily of Triatominae (Hemiptera, Reduviidae); which affects more than 70 genera of mammalian hosts [10]. Besides this, the parasite has a complex life cycle. The major evolutive forms of the human stage are the circulating infective but not replicative form known as trypomastigotes, and the replicative and intracellular forms, known as amastigotes. Extracellular amastigotes have been shown to be infective [11]. In the human host during the acute phase of CD the trypomastigotes are abundant in the peripheral blood, and during the chronic phase, the amastigotes are abundant in various tissues [12]. Metacyclic trypomastigotes (infective) and epimastigotes are present in the triatomine insects, the latter ones are usually reported as non-infective, but it has recently been demonstrated that differentiated epimastigotes from T. cruzi may be infective to the mammalian host [13]. Besides all this, there is an interplay between the trypanosome parasite and the host immune system to control the infection and this involves complex molecular mechanisms not yet completely understood but have been associated to the disease progression [14].