Materials and methods
Mosquito larvae
The Ae. albopictus larvae used in this study were kindly provided by
the Insect Physiology Laboratory of Chonbuk National University, Korea.
The mosquito larvae were kept at 28±1 °C, 65±5% of relative humidity
(RH) with a photoperiod of 16:8 (L:D) and feed with artificial diet in
the laboratory (Shin and Lee, 2014).
Isolation and identification of entomopathogenic fungi
Entomopathogenic fungal isolates were collected from soil by placing
Tenebrio molitor (mealworm) larvae on the soil for two weeks and
isolating the out-grown fungi from the surfaces of cadavers. The collection
of soil samples are summarized in Table 1. The fungal isolates were
identified by sequencing the internal transcribed spacer (ITS) region
and examining the morphological characteristics. The newly identified
and recorded isolates in Korea were firstly stored at Inset Molecular
and Biotechnological Laboratory (IMBL) of Chonbuk National University
as conidial suspensions in 20% glycerol at −80 °C (Humber, 1997) and
then deposited at the National Institute of Biological Resources (NIBR;
www.nibr.go.kr) (Incheon, Korea).