Anti-sulcatone cover-ups will be added to commercial mosquito repellants, if it looks like it would be a money maker!?!

Results of a new study recently reported in the journal Nature found that the yellow fever mosquito contains an odor-detecting gene in its antennae that is highly attuned to
Results of a new study recently reported in the journal Nature found that the yellow fever mosquito contains an odor-detecting gene in its antennae that is highly attuned to sulcatone, which is a common compound prevalent in human odor.
The study’s researchers reported that the AaegOr4 gene is more prevalent and sensitive in the human-preferring “domestic” form of the yellow fever mosquito than the “forest” form, its ancestor that typically goes after the blood of non-humans.
“The more we know about the genes and compounds that help mosquitoes target us, the better chance we have of manipulating their response to our odor,” Carolyn “Lindy” McBride, an assistant professor in Princeton University’s Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology and the Princeton Neuroscience Institute, said.
McBride performed the study when she was a postdoctoral researcher at Rockefeller University.
Uncovering the genetic basis of changes in behavior can help scientists and researchers understand the neural pathways that carry out that behavior, in addition to helping to develop ways to stem the yellow fever mosquito’s lust for human blood.
Yellow fever kills tens of thousands of people worldwide, most notably in Africa.
“At least one of the things that happened is a retuning of the ways odors are detected by the antennae,” McBride said. “We don’t yet know whether there are also differences in how odor information is interpreted by the brain.”
via Study finds possible explanation for why yellow fever mosquitoes favor human blood | Vaccine News Daily.
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