Latest Mosquito Stories
Alexander Raikhel's lab identifies a microRNA molecule that controls blood feeding and egg development in Aedes aegypti femalesEach year, dengue fever infects as many as 100 million people while yellow fever is responsible for about 30,000 deaths worldwide. Both diseases are spread by infected female Aedes aegypti mosquitoes, which require vertebrate blood to produce eggs. The blood feeding and the egg development are tightly linked to how the mosquito transmits the disease-causing virus.Now...
British scientists have created genetically modified sterile mosquitoes in an experiment to kill off others in their species, and researchers are hopeful that early field trials could help to stave off the rapid spread of dengue fever. This is the first time genetically altered mosquitoes have been set loose in the wild, after years of lab experiments and calculations. But while scientists believe the trial could lead to a breakthrough in halting the disease, critics argue that mutant...
KOLDING, Denmark, Nov. 11, 2010 /PRNewswire/ -- Bestnet Europe Ltd. will host a star-studded party in Kolding this evening for the world premiere of a new music video, "Hope is the Light." Award-winning singers, songwriters and producers will be present to celebrate the release of the new music video. Many of these notable talents volunteered their time and efforts to create the music video to increase awareness about malaria and the deadly toll it takes, in particular, on the vast number...
Research carried out in Mali, West Africa, has demonstrated that a new, safe and uncomplicated insect control method, developed at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, can bring about a serious decline in malaria-bearing mosquitoes in afflicted regions in the world.The research in Africa was based on work carried out earlier in Israel by researchers at the Kuvin Center for the Study of Tropical and Infectious Diseases at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem that showed how attractants of plant...
MONHEIM, Germany and WEST PALM BEACH, Fla., Nov. 1, 2010 /PRNewswire/ -- Bayer CropScience and SentiSearch, Inc. (OTC Bulletin Board: SSRC) have entered into a two-year research agreement to cooperate in the identification of new molecules targeting odorant receptors in insects. The aim of this collaboration, which also involves arrangements with Columbia University and Rockefeller University, is to develop innovative solutions to improve control of malaria and dengue fever in countries...
Researchers conclude more, not less, surveillance funding neededCutting surveillance for mosquito-borne diseases would likely translate into an exponential increase in both the number of human cases and the health costs when a disease outbreak occurs, according to an analysis by Emory University.The Public Library of Science (PLoS) published the research, led by Emory disease ecologist Gonzalo Vazquez-Prokopec, Oct. 26."Our analysis shows that halting mosquito surveillance can increase...
The development and first use of a high-density SNP array for the malaria vector mosquito have established 400,000 genetic markers capable of revealing new insights into how the insect adapts to outsmart insecticides and other preventive measures, according to findings published in the current edition of the journal Science. The SNP array's snapshot of the Anopheles gambiae genome can be used by scientists worldwide to advance public health efforts to contain and eliminate the deadly disease,...
WHAT: Researchers funded by the National Institutes of Health have found that the major malaria-transmitting mosquito species, Anopheles gambiae, is evolving into two separate species with different traits, a development that could both complicate malaria control efforts and potentially require new disease prevention methods. Their findings were published in back-to-back articles in the October 22 issue of the journal Science.A. gambiae is the most common vector of human malaria in...
Two strains of the type of mosquito responsible for the majority of malaria transmission in Africa have evolved such substantial genetic differences that they are becoming different species, according to researchers behind two new studies published today in the journal Science.Over 200 million people globally are infected with malaria, according to the World Health Organisation, and the majority of these people are in Africa. Malaria kills one child every 30 seconds.Today's international...
Scientists announced on Thursday that they had successfully sequenced the genome of the Southern house mosquito--the species of insect most responsible for the transmission of diseases such as West Nile virus, encephalitis, and elephantiasis.Writing in two separate papers published by the journal Science, a team of researchers from 39 universities in the United States and Europe reported that they had completely mapped the DNA of the Southern house mosquito, or Culex pipiens...
Latest Mosquito Reference Libraries
Yellow fever is an acute viral hemorrhagic disease with a 40 to 50 nm enveloped RNA virus with positive sense of the Flaviviridae family. It is transmitted by the bite of female mosquitoes and is found in tropical and subtropical areas in South America and Africa, but not in Asia. Primates and a few kinds of mosquitoes are the only known hosts. The origin of the disease is most likely Africa. From there it was introduced to South America through the slave trade in the 16th century. There...
Aedes albopictus (Family Culicidae), the Asian Tiger Mosquito or Forest Day Mosquito, is characterized by its black and white striped legs and small, black and white body. It was native to south-east Asia, and occupied a habitat that spread from Madagascar eastward to New Guinea, and north to the latitude of Korea. The typical member of the Aedes albopictus has a length of about 5 mm. As with other members of the mosquito family, the female is outfitted with an elongated proboscis that she...
The crane flies (Tipulidae) are a family of insects that closely resemble giant mosquitoes. Like the mosquito, they are in the order Diptera (flies) and are sometimes called mosquito eaters, mosquito hawks, or skeeter eaters. They are also one of three unrelated arthropods named Daddy long-legs. The other two are the harvestmen and vibrating, cellar or house spider. As such, Crane Flies are wrapped up in the myth of being the most poisonous spider, but unable to bite humans. This is...
The mosquito is a member of the family Culicidae. These insects have a pair of scaled wings, a pair of halteres, a slender body, and long legs. Only the females of most mosquito species suck blood from other animals. Size varies but is rarely greater than 0.6 inch (15 mm). Mosquitoes weigh only about 0.03 to 0.04 grain (2 to 2.5 mg). They can fly at about 0.9 to 1.6 mph (1.5 to 2.5 km/h) and most species are nocturnal. Mosquitoes are believed to have evolved 170 million years ago during...
