Geneticists close in on how mosquitos sniff out human sweat

https://www.sciencenews.org/article/genetics-how-mosquitoes-sniff-out-human-sweat?tgt=nr

Scientists have discovered that IR8a protein found in mosquito antennae is what is used by the mosquitoes to sniff out the lactic acid in human sweat, making them decide if it is "human enough" to bite., because they prefer human blood over that of animals.

If this scent protein is jammed, mosquitoes may become confused as to whether or not they should bite humans. It will be interesting to see what comes of this, because it could be a possibility that scientists can jam these proteins. Perhaps if these proteins are jammed in enough mosquitoes, they will reproduce with one another and evolve, so that they lose this protein.

Comments

  1. AnonymousApril 5, 2019 at 7:18 AM

    Ew, all these bugs are attracted to human sweat. I just read an article last night about sweat bees who BURIED IN A WOMANS EYE!!!! because they wanted her sweat. disgusting

    ReplyDelete
  2. AnonymousApril 11, 2019 at 6:38 PM

    It's weird to think that the things we find disgusting, such as sweat, actually attract other species. Now I know to avoid sweating if I want to prevent all of those bug bites!

    ReplyDelete
  3. AnonymousApril 15, 2019 at 1:46 PM

    This is so interesting! As impressive as it is that the mosquito can detect human sweat, it is also extremely impressive that we were able to figure this out.

    ReplyDelete

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