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Feeding an Appetite-Suppressing Human Drug To Mosquitos Make Them Lose Their Attraction To Blood By Around 80%: Study (nature.com)

Posted by msmash on from the marching-forward dept.

From Nature magazine: Female Aedes aegypti, like other mosquito species, feed on blood to get the protein they need to produce their eggs, and spread diseases such as dengue in the process. But once the mosquitoes have had their blood fix, they stop biting until they've laid their eggs several days later. Leslie Vosshall, a neurobiologist at the Rockefeller University in New York City, wondered whether she could hijack this biological process to switch off a mosquito's appetite.

Previous research had suggested that a mosquito's desire to feed is controlled by neuropeptides, molecules used by the nervous system to communicate. Vosshall and her team suspected that neuropeptide Y (NPY) receptors might be particularly important, because they form part of the molecular pathway involved in food-seeking behaviour for many animals -- including humans. Some human appetite-suppressant drugs already target the NPY receptors, so Vosshall decided to take a "completely zany" approach: feed these drugs to mosquitoes and see what happens. The method worked: mosquitoes that fed on a solution containing NPY-activating drugs were much less likely to approach a human-scented 'lure' than were the control group, and their appetites remained suppressed for two days. Further reading: A New Way to Keep Mosquitoes From Biting.

71 comments

  1. Bah by sunking2 · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Feeding them poison reduces it 100%

    1. Re:Bah by ShanghaiBill · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Feeding them poison reduces it 100%

      ... until they develop resistance. But they would have strong selective pressure to develop resistance to the appetite suppressor as well.

    2. Re:Bah by sunking2 · · Score: 1

      Not sure you understand how 100% fatality works...

    3. Re:Bah by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Not sure you understand how poisoning bugs works. It's not 100%

    4. Re:Bah by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Interesting

      We should use CRISPR to create a version of the mosquito that gets the protein from some source other than blood. Make them more fertile and with stronger mate-attraction characteristics than the existing mosquitoes, and release them into the wild.

      Then they will still be there to feed frogs and what-not, but they won't be giving us diseases. It's a win-win.

    5. Re:Bah by Phytophthora · · Score: 1

      Feeding them poison reduces it 100%

      Wrong... Feeding them poison reduces it 99.99999% - which can result in an in-sensitive population under the right conditions.

    6. Re:Bah by ShanghaiBill · · Score: 1

      Not sure you understand how 100% fatality works...

      Not sure if you understand that in the real world, no poison is 100% fatal, especially against a widely dispersed and hardy critter like Aedes aegypti. They range across millions of square miles of the tropics, and can breed in an upturned bottle cap.

    7. Re:Bah by Joce640k · · Score: 0

      Yep, it would be soooooo simple to solve this that way.

      I wonder why they haven't done it yet.

      --
      No sig today...
    8. Re:Bah by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Those who think that this is a good idea have no idea about how ecosystem works, let alone biology. Just remember, if anything is changed in the nature, there are domino effects along the line. The effect is range from trivia to significant, The trivia part would simply forces certain species to adapt to the new changes. The only ones that can adapt will survive but certain things will be changed. The significant part is an extinction of some species (unknown number).

      It seems that humans are the major factor to change things in nature because humans have high ability to adapt around the issues. I just hope that the changes wouldn't be too bad. However, it is definitely NOT a win-win situation.

    9. Re: Bah by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      And those that fear this fail to read actual ecological research. Guess what? Real, qualified scientists have studied this issue and have determined that the extinction of this particular mosquito would barely affect the ecosystem.

    10. Re:Bah by Bourdain · · Score: 1

      maybe so but check out this...

      https://www.nytimes.com/2018/1...

      i.e., even when, frighteningly, a LOT of insects have died off, the ecosystem is still okay seemingly?

      I would guess if we killed off all of the aedes aegypti, trophic compression would solve the problem sufficiently

    11. Re:Bah by onepoint · · Score: 1

      While I feel you are trolling, some others might think you are serious.

      by letting a natural genetic mutation work might be fine, and other critters might be able to deal with it, but a hand made mutation might have a chain impact on more than one creature.

      what I wonder is this, how many mosquitoes are needed to make a bat not interested in eating for a day or two.

      I prefer a simple increase the bat population and also use those laser beams that were made for this, back about 5 or 10 years ago, someone made a track and destroy beam against mosquitoes, but I think it went nowhere. sadly that would be the best defense at the home, with the least amount of issues for nature.

      I don't think natural selection is going to make an armored covered mosquito.

      --
      if you see me, smile and say hello.
    12. Re: Bah by plopez · · Score: 1

      citation?

      --
      putting the 'B' in LGBTQ+
    13. Re: Bah by jouassou · · Score: 1

      I'm not the AC above, but they probably thought about this one.

  2. I still prefer the laser solution by bobstreo · · Score: 1

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

    1. Re:I still prefer the laser solution by alvinrod · · Score: 2, Interesting

      In case anyone wasn't aware of these yet, the videos demonstrating how they work are pretty damn cool. Here's one that has slow motion captures of such a laser in action. It doesn't have any audio, but the whole thing is even more awesome if you open a video playing Wagner's Ride of the Valkyries in another tab.

    2. Re:I still prefer the laser solution by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      In case anyone wasn't aware of these yet, the videos demonstrating how they work are pretty damn cool. Here's one that has slow motion captures of such a laser in action. It doesn't have any audio, but the whole thing is even more awesome if you open a video playing Wagner's Ride of the Valkyries in another tab.

      KILL DA WABBIT!

      KILL DA WABBIT!

      Yeah, I was the one in the movie theater years ago who couldn't prevent myself from shouting, "Kill da wabbit! Kill da wabbit!" in an Elmer Fudd voice at the appropriate time in a showing of Apocalypse Now!

    3. Re:I still prefer the laser solution by mark-t · · Score: 1

      That's something I miss about modern movie going... there is less audience participation. I don't mean the rehearsed participation like what you get with Rocky Horror... I mean the real world, improvised stuff that is so perfect at the moment that it forever alters your experience of the film, even when you watch it at home years or decades later.

      Today, they kick people out of the theatre for that kind of stuff.

      --
      File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
    4. Re:I still prefer the laser solution by Locke2005 · · Score: 1

      They still do it in heavily African-American neighborhoods. My favorite story is about watching The Exorcist, and when Linda Blair was floating up in the air, someone shouted in a Don Pardo voice, "Come on down!"

      --
      I've abandoned my search for truth; now I'm just looking for some useful delusions.
    5. Re:I still prefer the laser solution by mark-t · · Score: 1
      We're getting OT here, but I can't resist relating the funniest one that happened in a theatre I was in. We were seeing Return of the Jedi when it came out, and the scene near the end where the Emperor is trying to convince Luke that his situation is hopeless and to surrender, he proclaims "Now witness the power of this fully armed and operational battle-station!", and then to his communicator he says, "Fire at will commander", there is brief shot of the fleet in space just before the cannon is fired and someone in the audience shouts out "Which one is Will?", raising audible laughter in the crowd just as the first rebellion's ship is destroyed.

      I cannot watch the movie today without that line being inserted in my brain as the cannon is firing.

      --
      File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
    6. Re:I still prefer the laser solution by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      uh yeah? if you want to do that go to open-mic nite at a comedy club, we don't want to hear your amateur impression of MST 2k.

    7. Re:I still prefer the laser solution by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      That's something I miss about modern movie going... there is less audience participation. I don't mean the rehearsed participation like what you get with Rocky Horror... I mean the real world, improvised stuff that is so perfect at the moment that it forever alters your experience of the film, even when you watch it at home years or decades later.

      Today, they kick people out of the theatre for that kind of stuff.

      Maybe, maybe not.

      Yeah, I went to see Highlander II. Expectations were high, based on the original.

      What a letdown.

      Not long into that dreck, the half of the audience left in the theater were all mocking it. Yeah, it was Friday after happy hour...

    8. Re:I still prefer the laser solution by mark-t · · Score: 1

      In my experience, I never heard more than one outburst in any given movie. Hardly an MST situation.

      --
      File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
    9. Re:I still prefer the laser solution by onepoint · · Score: 1

      thank you, I was wondering where this was.

      --
      if you see me, smile and say hello.
    10. Re:I still prefer the laser solution by plopez · · Score: 1

      My line was in the Two Towers movie when the elves show up at helm's deep (Elves at helm's deep? WTF?) in a loud voice and bad german accent "Ya, vee haf left our German Industrial band to help you!"

      --
      putting the 'B' in LGBTQ+
    11. Re:I still prefer the laser solution by Quirkz · · Score: 1

      "Which one's Will?"

      Oddly, I point to that same joke as the moment I decided I was too old for cartoons. I used to be a big G.I. Joe fan for a few years, but they went on hiatus for a while. A few years later I caught a new episode for about 30 seconds, where the above joke was delivered.

      "Man," I said to myself, "Was it always this bad and I just didn't notice?" Then I turned it off.

      Humor is situational, of course. Unprompted Jedi heckling, I could it see it working. Scripted in a terrorist assault, not so much.

      --
      The Quirkz Handbook of Self-Improvement for People Who Are Already Pretty Okay
  3. Feed 'em DDT by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    And help the humans being killed by malaria along the way, too.

    Yeah, I know, they're mostly brown. But hey, "progressives", they deserve the same shot at a sheltered life that you got.

    1. Re: Feed 'em DDT by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I'm glad you put progressives in scare quotes. Presumably because you know that actual progressives respect science and the ability of humans to solve problems collectively. "Progessives" oppose the CRISPR gene drives that would lead to the extinction of these mosquitoes due to entirely unfounded fears about genetic modification.

      Much like conservatives refuse to believe in anthropomorphic climate change. Note the lack of scare quotes there, it was intentional.

  4. Yeah, but what happens when they develop immunity? by rsilvergun · · Score: 1

    Then you've got freakin' mosquitoes with lazers on their heads. Betcha didn't think about that. Checkmate.

    --
    Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
  5. creimette by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    can they try it there

    1. Re:creimette by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      creimette should maybe make a weight loss video
      creimette looking paler and sicker lately
      amazing creimette could eat so much with only half the teeth of a normal human
      you must swallow half-chewed food like an alligator
      do you ever throw up the hooves and fur after a meal

    2. Re:creimette by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      creimette looking paler and sicker lately

      The new camcorder doesn't have the same color correction as the iPhone 6s. One of the tradeoffs for having a flippable screen, memory cards and external batteries.

    3. Re:creimette by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      i think creimette means color balance
      a professional creimette would check such things but perhaps the smell of the neighbor's cooking distracted creimette
      are you saying the new camera is more accurate and this is how creimette really looks
      yikes
      and why do you need a flippable screen
      the only thing flipping when i see your videos is my middle finger

  6. OK so you catch them and feed them pills.. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    So how would it work?

    You carry bottle of minipills with you and when you see mosquito wants to bite you - you catch it and feed it the pill and then it won't bite you, right?

    1. Re: OK so you catch them and feed them pills.. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Or something more reasonable might be to put that stuff out as bait and mix it with something yummy for them. You won't get them all but you'll have less coming at you. Probably more for scenarios where you're staying in the same place for a while.

  7. I know what to do by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    With my old 70s/80s supply of AYDS (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ayds)!

    1. Re:I know what to do by Locke2005 · · Score: 1

      I've always wondered why they stopped selling products with names like "AIDS"...

      --
      I've abandoned my search for truth; now I'm just looking for some useful delusions.
  8. HOSTS files block them all! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    There's only one true way to protect against mosquitoes and that's with HOSTS FILES!!!11!1

  9. Re: neuter indochimp msmash by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Hear hear!

  10. Human-scented lure ... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Mmmmhhh... huuman! *drool*

  11. Welcome to the next phase of pollution by holophrastic · · Score: 1

    We had water pollution in lakes, wells, and now oceans.
    We had air pollution and atmospheric pollution in ozone layers and smog.
    We had ground pollution in land-fills and dumps and litter.
    We had carbon pollution and carbon footprints.
    We had radiation pollution in nuclear disasters.
    We had light pollution.
    We had noise pollution.

    And now, now we're inventing bio pollution.

    Save the whales, save the dolphins, save the apes, save the birds. Screw up the mosquitoes?

    So the mosquitoes won't be hungry.
    And the birds will eat the mosquitoes.
    And the birds won't be hungry.
    And the frogs won't be hungry.
    And the fish won't be hungry.

    Then no one will lay any eggs.

    Am I the only one who feels like maybe we shouldn't be destroying what little wildlife we have left? You know, at the genetic level?

    1. Re:Welcome to the next phase of pollution by Locke2005 · · Score: 1

      It's called "The Law of Unintended Consequences". Google it.

      --
      I've abandoned my search for truth; now I'm just looking for some useful delusions.
    2. Re:Welcome to the next phase of pollution by holophrastic · · Score: 1

      You're mistaken. This consequence is very much intended. They want to reduce the mosquito population.

      That's the problem. Forget what-happens-next. They already have it wrong.

      What they really want is to stop mosquitoes from biting humans. That has absolutely nothing to do with killing mosquitoes.

      Actually, I take that back. That too is too far. What they really want is to stop mosquitoes from spreading diseases to humans.

      Again, absolutely nothing to do with the mosquito population.

      It's not a "consequence" when it's the direct result of what you're doing. That's called cause and effect.

    3. Re:Welcome to the next phase of pollution by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Feeding appetite-suppressing chemicals to the American population? That doesn't seem a bad idea...

  12. I don't want them to stop biting. by Java+Pimp · · Score: 1

    I just want them to stop biting me.

    There are other organisms (bats, spiders) that kinda like mosquitos for dinner. Probably shouldn't do something likely to kill them off.

    --
    Ascalante: Your bride is over 3,000 years old.
    Kull: She told me she was 19!
    1. Re:I don't want them to stop biting. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Yea if we mess with them we need to find some way to re-target them or turn them into pollinators. They still need to breed prolifically in bodies of water and fly around. Don't underestimate how many ecosystems rely on their larvae.

    2. Re:I don't want them to stop biting. by HiThere · · Score: 1

      Actually, only a small minority of kinds of mosquito target humans. And so far experiments haven't demonstrated ANY harm in totally removing mosquitoes from an eco-system. Now admittedly, all the tests have been on small islands.

      My real question would be "What happens when they evolve to be resistant to this approach?", because one obvious possibility is that they don't only bite when they get hungry.

      --

      I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.
    3. Re:I don't want them to stop biting. by CaptainDork · · Score: 2

      So let's solve the real problem: Genetically engineer pest-resistant humans.

      --
      It little behooves the best of us to comment on the rest of us.
    4. Re:I don't want them to stop biting. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Actually, only a small minority of kinds of mosquito target humans.

      it only takes one kind, or is that too obvious

    5. Re:I don't want them to stop biting. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      "And so far experiments haven't demonstrated ANY harm in totally removing mosquitoes from an eco-system" - You are uninformed and making shit up.

    6. Re:I don't want them to stop biting. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Mosquito internet defense force here. Why do you want n1ggers to die?

    7. Re: I don't want them to stop biting. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Nope, the real internet and actual ecologists support the grandparent.

      I don't care to supply search terms for someone so idiotic.

    8. Re:I don't want them to stop biting. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The type of mosquito being discussed here aren't actually a major food source for any creature, winged or 8-legged.

  13. Vampires by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Does the drug work on vampires, too?

  14. Neat idea, not entirely novel though by pi_rules · · Score: 1

    Stopping an insect from feeding to reduce damage to crops isn't unheard of in agriculture. IRAC groups 9 and 29 are chemicals that stop feeding of target insects. Generally this results in mortality after a while but they tend to stop feeding/damaging the crop shortly after application.

    Not trying to rain on their parade or anything. The general idea isn't new but this specific mode of action on this target appears to be totally new. Kinda cool.

  15. Stupid question: by Locke2005 · · Score: 1

    Wouldn't it be a lot easier to slap the little bastards into oblivion than to feed them diet pills?

    --
    I've abandoned my search for truth; now I'm just looking for some useful delusions.
    1. Re:Stupid question: by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Wouldn't it be a lot easier to slap the little bastards into oblivion than to feed them diet pills?

      tell us more about why you like to slap yourself

  16. Editors can't grammar by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    My fifth-grader caught the error in the headline. Can't you guys try even a little bit?

  17. Weight loss by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Feeding an Appetite-Suppressing Human Drug To Mosquitos Make Them Lose Their ... WEIGHT :-)

  18. Better Idea by ememisya · · Score: 2

    I suggest cyclopentolate. One drop on each eye and the mosquito will not be able to see where it's going for several hours.

  19. Darwin will prevail! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Natural selection will take over and new species will come out that will suck blood even when they don't need it, since only the ones that did ignore the drug will survive...

  20. Why not kill them? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    If you can feed them diet pills can you not kill them more easily instead?

  21. Obligatory pun by TimMD909 · · Score: 1

    I'm sure this news really sucks for mosquitos...

  22. Fake blood? by HaaPoo · · Score: 2

    Same as many vampire movies, why do not we develop fake blood that taste better than human blood, and setup feeding stations for them. They may leave us alone.

  23. And then if you want to lose weight... by rv6502 · · Score: 1

    ... just stop using mosquito repellent.

  24. They're pollinators by plopez · · Score: 1

    Let's just kill all pollinators. Great idea there.

    --
    putting the 'B' in LGBTQ+
  25. Quoting my own church... by BadTuna · · Score: 1

    There shall be no such measure that does not provide millions upon one or two of my disciples.
    John 3:16

    --
    Your sig here!