Mosquito ABC transporters: A pharmacological barrier to anticholinesterase delivery

Mosquitoes affect human health worldwide as a result of their ability to vector disease. Widespread resistance limits the use of current mosquitocides to reduce the risk of mosquito-vectored disease. Thus, mosquitocide resistance is a serious public health challenge that warrants the development of improved mosquitocide control strategies for these disease vectors. The ATP-binding cassette (ABC) transporters are efflux proteins that assist in maintaining the hemolymph-brain barrier (HBB) interface of mosquitoes and serves as a first line of defense to mosquitocide exposures. Previous studies demonstrate the mosquito HBB to interfere with the target-site delivery and action of anticholinesterase chemistries; however, knowledge of these chemistries interacting with mosquito ABC transporters is limited. Here, we will summarize an examination of ABC transporter substrates and inhibitory ligands for the yellow fever mosquito, Aedes aegypti. These data will be discussed with regard to the use of chemomodulators for increased target-site delivery and action of mosquitocides.