The incidence rates of Chagas disease have been substantially reduced in Brazil and other South American countries following a successful effort to eradicate its main vector, Triatoma infestans (Coura & Dias 2009) . Nevertheless, Northeastern and Amazonian Brazil are considered regions that may present a special concern regarding control of the disease: human populations are in increasing contact with many autochthonous sylvatic triatomine species due to ecological disequilibrium and anthropic

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... nvironmental transformations (Costa & Lorenzo 2009 , Fé et al. 2009 , Guhl et al. 2009 ). Among the sylvatic species of triatomines inhabiting natural ecotopes in xerophytic ecosystems, Triatoma brasiliensis, Triatoma pseudomaculata and Rhodnius nasutus deserve special attention. These species, which have been found colonizing peridomestic ecotopes in Northeastern Brazil, are often infected with Trypanosoma cruzi (Sarquis et al. 2004 , 2006 , Lima & Sarquis 2008) . Given these observations, a better understanding of the biological aspects of these potential Chagas disease vectors in Northeastern Brazil is needed. Although there is little evidence that T. cruzi infection can cause substantial harm to the invertebrate vector, the pathological interaction between T. cruzi and T. brasiliensis has not yet been studied. In the present study, we analyzed the effects of T. cruzi infection on the developmental and reproductive aspects of T. brasiliensis under laboratory conditions.