Why mosquitoes like to feast on human blood.Byline: ANI Washington, Oct 27 (ANI): Scientists at the University of California, Davis The University of California, Davis, commonly known as UC Davis, is one of the ten campuses of the University of California, and was established as the University Farm in 1905. , have discovered why mosquitoes like to feast on the blood of humans. They have identified a dominant odour naturally produced in humans and birds that attracts the blood-feeding Culex Culex /Cu·lex/ (ku´leks) a genus of mosquitoes found throughout the world, many species of which are vectors of disease-producing organisms. Cu·lex n. mosquitoes, which transmits West Nile virus West Nile virus, microorganism and the infection resulting from it, which typically produces no symptoms or a flulike condition. The virus is a flavivirus and is related to a number of viruses that cause encephalitis. and other life-threatening diseases. The groundbreaking research explains why mosquitoes shifted hosts from birds to humans and paves the way for key developments in mosquito and disease control. Entomology professor Walter Leal LEAL. Loyal; that which belongs to the law. and postdoctoral researcher Zain Syed, UC Davis Department of Entomology, found that nonanal (pronounced "no-nan-al") is the powerful semiochemical A semiochemical is a generic term used for a chemical substance or mixture that carries a message. It is usually used in the field of Entomology to encompass pheromones, allomones, kairomones, attractants and repellants. that triggers the mosquitoes' keen sense of smell, directing them toward a blood meal. A semiochemical is a chemical substance or mixture that carries a message. "Nonanal is how they find us. The antennae of the Culex quinquefasciatus are highly developed to detect even extremely low concentrations of nonanal," Leal said. Mosquitoes detect smells with the olfactory receptor neurons of their antennae. Birds, the main hosts of mosquitoes, serve as the reservoir for the West Nile virus, Leal said. When infected mosquitoes take a blood meal, they transmit the virus to their hosts, which include birds, humans, horses, dogs, cats, bats, chipmunks, skunks, squirrels and domestic rabbits. During the study, the researchers tested hundreds of naturally occurring compounds emitted by people and birds. They collected chemical odours from 16 adult human subjects, representing multiple races and ethnic groups. "We then determined the specificity and sensitivity of the olfactory receptor neurons to the isolated compounds on the antennae of the mosquitoes," Syed said. The researchers found that nonanal acts synergistically with carbon dioxide, a known mosquito attractant attractant a material used to attract animals for capture purposes. . "We baited mosquito traps with a combination of nonanal and carbon dioxide and we were drawing in as many as 2,000 a night in Yolo County, near Davis. Nonanal, in combination with carbon dioxide, increased trap captures by more than 50 percent, compared to traps baited with carbon dioxide alone," Syed said. The research has been published this week in the early online edition of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences The Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, usually referred to as PNAS, is the official journal of the United States National Academy of Sciences. . (ANI) Copyright 2009 Asian News International The Asian News International (ANI) agency provides multimedia news to China and 50 bureaus in India. It covers virtually all of South Asia since its foundation and presently claims, on its official website, to be the leading South Asia-wide news agency. (ANI) - All Rights Reserved. Provided by Syndigate.info an Albawaba.com company |
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