Mosquitoes learn to avoid the smell of toxic pesticides, even if it means starvation, finds a February 17 study in Scientific Reports. This could make pesticides less effective, the authors suggest, complicating efforts to control populations of the insects in areas with heavy burdens of mosquito-borne diseases.
“This new paper shows that mosquitoes are very good at remembering odors associated with bad things,” Christopher Potter, a neuroscientist at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine who was not involved in the study, tells The Scientist in an email. “The fascinating aspect of this work is that it reinforces to us that mosquitoes are far more complex than simple flying hypodermic needles.”
After decades of relying on a limited number of pesticides, mosquitoes have begun to evolve resistance to the most commonly used classes of toxins, including mutations that evade pesticide binding or increase detoxification, threatening the success of mosquito control programs. ...
