A female Aedes aegypti mosquito acquires a blood meal from her human host, who in this instance was actually the biomedical photographer James Gathany at the Centers for Disease Control. The feeding apparatus consisted of a sharp, orange-colored "fascicle" that was covered in a soft, pliant sheath called the "labellum" while not feeding. The labellum was shown here retracted as the sharp "stylets" contained within pierced the host's skin surface, thereby allowing the insect to obtain its blood meal. The orange color of the fascicle was due to the red color of the blood as it migrated up the thin, sharp translucent tube. Though out of focus in the background, note the droplet of newly ingested blood that had been expelled, and dispersed from the distal abdominal tip merely due to over-engorgement on the host's blood.
Source:
Content provider: CDC/Prof. Frank Hadley Collins, Dir., Cntr for Global Health and Infectious Diseases, Univ. of Notre Dame; Photo: James Gathany
Creator:
CDC/Prof. F.H. Collins, Univ. of Notre Dame; Photo: James Gathany
