TY  - JOUR
T1  - Building Stable Transmission-Blocking Mosquito Microbiomes Requires Ecological Compatibility, Functional Redundancy, Evolutionary Control, and Reliable Environmental Persistence
A1  - Adamu Sani
A1  - Grace Nwachukwu
A1  - Kehinde Ogunleye
A1  - Bola Ajayi
JF  - Entomology and Applied Science Letters
JO  - Entomol Appl Sci Lett
SN  - 2349-2864
Y1  - 2026
VL  - 13
IS  - 2
DO  - 10.51847/zBMs7oIXsz
SP  - 13
EP  - 23
N2  - Microbiome-based transmission blocking offers a route to reduce mosquito-borne pathogen transmission by modifying microbial functions within vector hosts rather than relying exclusively on conventional insecticidal or genetic interventions. However, pathogen inhibition by an introduced microorganism does not establish that the intervention will remain functional across mosquito genotypes, developmental stages, microbial communities, environmental conditions, or pathogen evolutionary trajectories. This article develops an evidence-grounded conceptual structure for designing stable transmission-blocking synthetic mosquito microbiomes. The approach integrates community assembly, host compatibility, mechanistic functional redundancy, pathogen inhibition, evolutionary control, environmental persistence, transmission routes, ecological safeguards, and longitudinal monitoring as distinct but interdependent validation domains. The strongest synthesis is that durable transmission blocking cannot be inferred from the performance of a single microbial isolate or from short-term laboratory colonization. Stability instead requires compatible microbial coexistence, retention of blocking function after loss or alteration of individual members, resistance to ecological and evolutionary disruption, and sufficient persistence in target mosquitoes without uncontrolled spread through non-target hosts or environments. Current evidence supports individual elements of this structure, including host-dependent colonization, environmentally contingent microbial effects, mechanistically distinct pathogen-blocking functions, long-term persistence of selected inherited symbionts, and horizontal or environmental transmission by some candidate microorganisms. Nevertheless, complete synthetic communities have not been prospectively validated across these domains, and evidence remains highly dependent on mosquito species, microbial strain, pathogen lineage, life stage, rearing conditions, and spatial and temporal scale. Stable transmission-blocking microbiomes should therefore be developed through stage-gated validation in which assembly, function, evolution, persistence, spread, safety, and monitoring are evaluated separately before being integrated into a bounded ecological design.
UR  - https://easletters.com/article/building-stable-transmission-blocking-mosquito-microbiomes-requires-ecological-compatibility-functi-w92x3inytnb3qpg
ER  -