FIG 5.

Impact of E2 mutations on the fitness of Asian lineage CHIKV in Aedes albopictus in the context of E3-33E. Aedes albopictus mosquitoes were fed artificial blood meals with approximately equal genomic ratios of wt and E2 mutant CHIKV Mal06, both containing an introduced E3-33E mutation. At 10 dpi, heads were collected, and their virus mixture was passaged for 2 days in Vero cells. The resulting cell culture supernatant was amplified by RT-PCR, and the ratio of wt to mutant CHIKV was determined by Sanger sequencing. Relative replicative fitness values were calculated as described in Materials and Methods. The Holm-Sidak correction for multiple P values was applied. ns, not significant (P ≥ 0.05); ****, P < 0.0001.