Persistence Rewarded

Seemingly always able to find us, mosquitoes can detect the CO₂ that we breathe out, and odours from our sweat. Later, they sense the warmth of our skin, and this sequence of cues prompts them to feed. CO₂ stimulates mosquitoes to fly, expecting a host to be nearby, but recent research suggests it also activates a more long-term hunting mode, keeping them motivated to search. Here are female Aedes aegypti mosquitoes, genetically engineered so the sensory neurons that normally respond to CO₂ are activated by red light, allowing researchers to precisely manipulate when mosquitoes are stimulated. After a pulse of light, they burst into action, flying or probing the blood meal beneath them, then remain primed to feed for up to 15 minutes. More than mere irritants, mosquitoes are vectors for serious diseases, from malaria to Zika, so understanding how they respond to humans could be useful for reducing transmission.

Written by Emmanuelle Briolat

Emmanuelle Briolat

Writer

A researcher specialising in visual signals in Lepidoptera, camouflage and the effects of light pollution, Emmanuelle’s writing covers a range of topics, from biomedical research to children’s books about moth defences.

Website

• Video from work by Trevor R Sorrells and colleagues
• Laboratory of Neurogenetics and Behavior, The Rockefeller University, New York, NY, USA
• Video originally published with a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)
• Published in eLife, May 2022