Global Analysis of Small Non-Coding RNA Populations across Tissues in the Malaria Vector, Anopheles gambiae

• Published in: Insects (Basel, Switzerland) Switzerland), 2020-06, Vol.11 (7), p.406
• Main Authors: Bryant, William Bart, Ray, Savanna, Mills, Mary Katherine
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: mosquito reproduction; piRNA; small non-coding RNA; small RNAs
• ISSN: 2075-4450; 2075-4450
• DOI: 10.3390/insects11070406

Malaria is a major global health problem, where the anautogenous female mosquito serves as a major vector. In order to combat this devastating disease, understanding mosquito physiology is paramount. Numerous studies in the vector field demonstrate that small non-coding RNAs (ncRNAs) play essential roles in numerous aspects of mosquito physiology. While our previous miRNA annotation work demonstrated expression dynamics across differing tissues, miRNAs represented less than 20% of all small ncRNAs in our small RNA-Seq libraries. To this end, we systematically classified multiple small ncRNA groups across mosquito tissues. Here we (i) determined a new enriched-midgut miRNA, (ii) updated the piRNA annotation in ovaries with a genomic map of unique-mapping piRNAs, (iii) identified pan-tissue and tissue-enriched mRNA-derived small ncRNAs, and (iv) assessed AGO1- and AGO2- loading of candidate small ncRNAs. Continued research will broaden our view of small ncRNAs and greatly aide in our understanding on how these molecules contribute to mosquito physiology.