Description of Culicosporella
provided by BioPedia
Life cycle polymorphic with monokaryotic and diplokaryotic stages involving larvae and adults of one generation of one host species; three types of spores; in larvae: oval diplokaryotic meronts are in blood and fat body cells. Division has not been described, final meronts transform into sporonts of two types: a) Diplokaryotic sporonts secrete a non-persistent sporophorous vesicle, within which multiple fission produces up to 8 sporoblasts via rosette formation. Binucleate spores, 7.1 x 3.8 µm, are thin-walled, lanceolate, curved, with compart-mentalised polaroplast and tapering isofilar polar tube with 10 coils, these spores are responsible for horizontal (per os) transmission to new larvae. b) Diplokaryotic sporonts undergo karyogamy, restoration of the diplokaryon, meiosis and production of monokaryotic sporoblasts in a sporophorous vesicle; there are 2 - 8 sporoblasts depending on the number of sporogonic divisions. Spores 3.9 x 4.5 µm uninucleate, thick-walled, barrel-shaped and internally organised like those of Amblyospora; in adult females: pre-spore stages were not observed but were assumed to be diplokaryotic; Nosema-like spores, 2.4 x 1.4 µm, diplokaryotic, elongate and Nosema-like similar to those responsible for transovarial transmission in other octosporous genera; type species C. lunata (Hazard and Savage, 1970) Weiser, 1977 in larvae and adults of Culex pilosus (Diptera, Culicidae).
