Projeto Ciência sem Fronteiras

Title: Diversity of entomopathogenic fungi affecting Diptera important for human and animal health in areas of Goiás and Tocantins.

The project funded by CAPES (CsF/PVE Nº 71/2013) proposes three years of studies (2014 - 2017) focusing on the pathogenic fungi affecting dipteran insect vectors of importance for human and animal health in the Brazilian States of Goiás and Tocantins. At the beginning, activities will be restricted to greater Goiânia while over the next time will be extended in the two States. The project will focus on biting fly disease vectors in such nematoceran families as Culicidae (mosquitoes), Psychodidae (sandflies), Simuliidae (blackflies) and Ceratopogonidae (biting midges), as well as cyclorrhaphan flies such as species of Muscidae. The greatest effort will be placed on ascomycete fungi (phylum Ascomycota) in the class Sordariomycetes, order Hypocreales, as well as on the zygomycetous entomopathogens in the newly described phylum Entomophthoromycota, the posteriorly flagellate watermolds of the phylum Blastocladiomycota, and also the few but important straminipilan (chromistan) mosquito pathogens in the class Peronosporomycetes. The planned studies will be developed with a special visitor researcher (PVE), Dr. Richard Alan Humber of the USDA-ARS Robert W. Holley Center for Agriculture, Biological Health & Integrated Pest Management Research, Ithaca, United States, post-graduate students (Post-doc, PhD and master students) and undergraduate students. The project envisages training of students in Brazil and other countries and an intensive exchange with national and international institutions especially in the USDA in Ithaca.