MATHEMATICAL ANALYSIS OF DENGUE CONTROL THROUGH WOLBACHIA DRIVEN PATHOGEN BLOCKING IN AEDES AEGYPTI POPULATIONS
Keywords:
Dengue, Aedes aegypti, Wolbachia, mathematical modelling, basic reproduction number, sensitivity analysis, pathogen blockingAbstract
Dengue remains a major vector-borne disease in tropical and subtropical regions, where conventional vector-control approaches face limitations due to operational challenges and increasing insecticide resistance. Wolbachia-based population replacement has emerged as a promising biological intervention by reducing the vector competence of Aedes aegypti mosquitoes; however, its effectiveness depends on complex interactions among pathogen blocking, maternal transmission, mosquito fitness, and release strategies. This study develops a deterministic dengue–Wolbachia transmission model incorporating wild-type and Wolbachia-infected mosquito populations, imperfect maternal transmission, pathogen-blocking efficacy, and continuous augmentation of Wolbachia-infected mosquitoes. The model is analysed using positivity and boundedness theory, disease-free equilibrium analysis, basic reproduction number derivation, stability analysis, sensitivity analysis, and numerical simulations. The basic reproduction number was obtained using the next-generation matrix approach to determine the threshold conditions governing dengue invasion and elimination. Numerical simulations demonstrate that increasing Wolbachia pathogen-blocking efficacy reduces transmission potential and infectious prevalence. Under the baseline intervention scenario, the model produced a reproduction number of 
, indicating convergence towards the disease-free equilibrium. Increasing pathogen-blocking efficacy from 0.40 to 0.9575 reduced the reproduction number from 0.9739 to 0.9292 and decreased final infectious prevalence by approximately 55%. Sensitivity analysis identified mosquito biting rate and mosquito–human transmission probabilities as dominant drivers of dengue transmission, whereas pathogen blocking contributed to reducing epidemic potential. The findings highlight that successful Wolbachia-based dengue control depends not only on pathogen-blocking efficiency but also on maintaining effective mosquito population replacement and reducing mosquito–human contact. The proposed framework provides a mathematical basis for evaluating Wolbachia interventions and identifying key biological parameters that influence dengue transmission dynamics.
References
Barlow, A., & Adams, B. (2025). Household scale Wolbachia release strategies for effective dengue control. In ArXiv.org. https://doi.org/10.48550/arxiv.2507.23636
Bhatt, S., Gething, P. W., Brady, O. J., Messina, J. P., Farlow, A. W., Moyes, C. L., Drake, J. M., Brownstein, J. S., Hoen, A. G., Sankoh, O., Myers, M. F., George, D. B., Jaenisch, T., Wint, G. R. W., Simmons, C. P., Scott, T. W., Farrar, J. J., & Hay, S. I. (2013). The global distribution and burden of dengue. Nature, 496(7446), 504–507. https://doi.org/10.1038/nature12060
Dennison, N., Jupatanakul, N., & Dimopoulos, G. (2014). The mosquito microbiota influences vector competence for human pathogens. Current Opinion in Insect Science, 3, 6–13. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cois.2014.07.004
Diekmann, O., Heesterbeek, J. A. P., & Metz, J. A. J. (1990). On the definition and the computation of the basic reproduction ratio (R_0) in models for infectious diseases in heterogeneous populations. Journal of Mathematical Biology, 28(4), 365–382. https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00178324
Diekmann, O., Heesterbeek, J. A. P., & Roberts, M. G. (2010). The construction of next-generation matrices for compartmental epidemic models. Journal of the Royal Society Interface, 7(47), 873–885. https://doi.org/10.1098/rsif.2009.0386
Dorigatti, I., McCormack, C., Nedjati-Gilani, G., & Ferguson, N. M. (2018). Using Wolbachia for dengue control: Insights from modelling. Trends in Parasitology, 34(2), 102–113. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.pt.2017.11.002
Ekong, P. S., Aworh, M. K., Grossi-Soyster, E. N., Wungak, Y. S., Maurice, N. A., Altamirano, J., Ekong, M. J., Olugasa, B. O., Nwosuh, C. I., Shamaki, D., Faburay, B., & LaBeaud, D. A. (2022). A retrospective study of the seroprevalence of dengue virus and chikungunya virus exposures in Nigeria, 2010–2018. Pathogens, 11(7), 762. https://doi.org/10.3390/pathogens11070762
Ferguson, N. M., Kien, D. T. H., Clapham, H., Aguas, R., Trung, V. T., Chau, T. N. B., Popovici, J., Ryan, P. A., O’Neill, S. L., McGraw, E. A., Long, V. T., Dui, L. T., Nguyen, H. L., Chau, N. V. V., Wills, B., & Simmons, C. P. (2015). Modeling the impact on virus transmission of Wolbachia-mediated blocking of dengue virus infection of Aedes aegypti. Science Translational Medicine, 7(279), 279ra37. https://doi.org/10.1126/scitranslmed.3010370
Hoffmann, A. A., Montgomery, B. L., Popovici, J., Iturbe-Ormaetxe, I., Johnson, P. H., Muzzi, F., Greenfield, M., Durkan, M., Leong, Y. S., Dong, Y., Cook, H., Axford, J., Callahan, A. G., Kenny, N., Omodei, C., McGraw, E. A., Ryan, P. A., Ritchie, S. A., Turelli, M., & O’Neill, S. L. (2011). Successful establishment of Wolbachia in Aedes populations to suppress dengue transmission. Nature, 476(7361), 454–457. https://doi.org/10.1038/nature10356
Kolimenakis, A., Heinz, S., Wilson, M. L., Winkler, V., Yakob, L., Michaelakis, A., Papachristos, D., Richardson, C., & Horstick, O. (2021). The role of urbanisation in the spread of Aedes mosquitoes and the diseases they transmit—A systematic review. PLoS Neglected Tropical Diseases, 15(9), e0009631. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pntd.0009631
Luz, P. M., Vanni, T., Medlock, J., Paltiel, A. D., & Galvani, A. P. (2011). Dengue vector control strategies in an urban setting: an economic modelling assessment. The Lancet, 377(9778), 1673–1680. https://doi.org/10.1016/s0140-6736(11)60246-8
Mordecai, E. A., Cohen, J. M., Evans, M. V., Gudapati, P., Johnson, L. R., Lippi, C. A., Miazgowicz, K., Murdock, C. C., Rohr, J. R., Ryan, S. J., Savage, V., Shocket, M. S., Stewart-Ibarra, A. M., Thomas, M. B., & Weikel, D. P. (2017). Detecting the impact of temperature on transmission of Zika, dengue, and chikungunya using mechanistic models. PLoS Neglected Tropical Diseases, 11(4), e0005568. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pntd.0005568
Moyes, C. L., Vontas, J., Martins, A. J., Ng, L. C., Koou, S. Y., Dusfour, I., Raghavendra, K., Pinto, J., Corbel, V., David, J.-P., & Weetman, D. (2017). Contemporary status of insecticide resistance in the major Aedes vectors of arboviruses infecting humans. PLoS Neglected Tropical Diseases, 11(7), e0005625. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pntd.0005625
Ndii, M. Z. (2020). Modelling the use of vaccine and Wolbachia on dengue transmission dynamics. Tropical Medicine and Infectious Disease, 5(2), 78. https://doi.org/10.3390/tropicalmed5020078
Ndii, M. Z., Hickson, R. I., Allingham, D., & Mercer, G. N. (2015). Modelling the transmission dynamics of dengue in the presence of Wolbachia. Mathematical Biosciences, 262, 157–166. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.mbs.2014.12.011
Ogunlade, S. T., Adekunle, A. I., Meehan, M. T., & McBryde, E. S. (2023). Quantifying the impact of Wolbachia releases on dengue infection in Townsville, Australia. Scientific Reports, 13, 14932. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-023-42336-2
Okomo, U., Fitzgerald, F., Feasey, N., Mehtar, S., & Dramowski, A. (2026). Infection prevention and control in low- and middle-income countries: policy, practice, and implementation challenges in sub-Saharan Africa. Clinical Microbiology Reviews, 39(2). https://doi.org/10.1128/cmr.00142-22
Olmo, R. P., Todjro, Y. M. H., Aguiar, E. R. G. R., Almeida, J. P. P. de, Ferreira, F. V., Armache, J. N., Faria, I. J. S. de, Ferreira, Á., Amadou, S. C. G., Silva, A. T. S., Souza, K. P. R. de, Vilela, A. P. P., Babarit, A., Tan, C. H., Diallo, M., Gaye, A., Paupy, C., Obame‐Nkoghe, J., Visser, T. M., … Marques, J. T. (2023). Mosquito vector competence for dengue is modulated by insect-specific viruses. Nature Microbiology, 8(1), 135–149. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41564-022-01289-4
Otu, A. A., Udoh, U. A., Ita, O. I., Hicks, J. P., Egbe, W. O., & Walley, J. (2019). A cross-sectional survey on the seroprevalence of dengue fever in febrile patients attending health facilities in Cross River State, Nigeria. PLoS ONE, 14(4), e0215143. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0215143
Safi, M. A., & Gumel, A. B. (2011). Qualitative study of a quarantine/isolation model with multiple disease stages. Applied Mathematics and Computation, 218(5), 1941–1961. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.amc.2011.07.007
Shuai, Z., & van den Driessche, P. (2013). Global stability of infectious disease models using Lyapunov functions. SIAM Journal on Applied Mathematics, 73(4), 1513–1532. https://doi.org/10.1137/120876642
Smith, D. L., Battle, K. E., Hay, S. I., Barker, C. M., Scott, T. W., & McKenzie, F. E. (2012). Ross, Macdonald, and a theory for the dynamics and control of mosquito-transmitted pathogens. PLoS Pathogens, 8(4), e1002588. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.ppat.1002588
Tizhe, D. T., Kwaga, J. K. P., & Nok Kia, G. S. (2022). Serological and molecular survey for dengue virus infection in suspected febrile patients in selected local government areas in Adamawa State, Nigeria. Vaccines, 10(9), 1407. https://doi.org/10.3390/vaccines10091407
Utarini, A., Indriani, C., Ahmad, R. A., Tantowijoyo, W., Arguni, E., Ansari, M. R., Supriyati, E., Wardana, D. S., Meitika, Y., Ernesia, I., Nurhayati, I., Prabowo, E., Andari, B., Green, B. R., Hodgson, L., Cutcher, Z., Rancès, E., Ryan, P. A., O’Neill, S. L., … Simmons, C. P. (2021). Efficacy of Wolbachia-infected mosquito deployments for the control of dengue. The New England Journal of Medicine, 384(23), 2177–2186. https://doi.org/10.1056/NEJMoa2030243
van den Driessche, P., & Watmough, J. (2002). Reproduction numbers and sub-threshold endemic equilibria for compartmental models of disease transmission. Mathematical Biosciences, 180(1–2), 29–48. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0025-5564(02)00108-6
Vyhmeister, E., Provan, G., Doyle, B., Bourke, B., Castane, G. G., & Reyes-Bozo, L. (2022). Comparison of time series and mechanistic models of vector-borne diseases. Spatial and Spatio-temporal Epidemiology, 41, 100478. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.sste.2022.100478
Walker, T., Johnson, P. H., Moreira, L. A., Iturbe-Ormaetxe, I., Frentiu, F. D., McMeniman, C. J., Leong, Y. S., Dong, Y., Axford, J., Kriesner, P., Lloyd, A. L., Ritchie, S. A., O’Neill, S. L., & Hoffmann, A. A. (2011). The wMel Wolbachia strain blocks dengue and invades caged Aedes aegypti populations. Nature, 476(7361), 450–453. https://doi.org/10.1038/nature10355
Zhang, H., & Lui, R. (2020). Releasing Wolbachia-infected Aedes aegypti to prevent the spread of dengue virus: A mathematical study. Infectious Disease Modelling, 5, 142–160. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.idm.2019.12.004
Downloads
Published
Issue
Section
License
Copyright (c) 2026 This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, adaptation, and reproduction in any medium, provided that the original work is properly cited.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License.
Authors are permitted to post their work online in institutional/disciplinary repositories or on their own websites. Pre-print versions posted online should include a citation and link to the final published version in Journal of Librarianship and Scholarly Communication as soon as the issue is available; post-print versions (including the final publisher's PDF) should include a citation and link to the journal's website.
