Why DoThey Bite?

The mosquito is probably one of the most annoying insect there could possibly be. They come out in the dark and they usually start appearing around spring. There bites leave nasty welts that have a severe itchy sensation. But what attracts these six legged demons to us. Walter Leal believes that they are attracted by our order. He proved his own hypothesis right when he found out that humans and birds produce nonanal, a scent, that drives mosquitoes crazy for it. Using a syringe like instrument and tin foil to wrap his arm, Walter casted a experiment to test if he had nonanal and if he did, how much? He found out that not only did he have it but a lot of it as well. Walter recalls a moment when on a certain research day he was out on the Amazon where he sprayed so much mosquito repellent and still found himself the next day with a ton of bites on his foot. He said they went threw his thick sucks just to get at his blood. Walter was the first to discover that Deet, a type of mosquito repellent, had a smell that the mosquitoes hated but even when he thought he sprayed it every where he found a patch of bites in a small area. He said “They will find any spot you didn’t spray” Walter also says that out of all the insects he worked with these are the most annoying. During other experiments on mosquitoes he wanted to find out why you can’t feel their bite all the time. He discovered that when they bite us they release a saliva type mixture that not only draws blood to the wound but also num the pain sort of like a painkiller.
This topic has to do with the chemical biology of humans and mosquitoes. A scientist like Walter knows that sent that comes from humans attracts mosquitoes and he knows that the chemical they put in the wound numbs the pain. These are all based on the chemical biology of both humans and mosquitoes. So because this related to the chemicals that these two species give off this would be a direct topic of biology.
Walters’s discoveries in the field of mosquitoes have proved a great help. By understanding the mosquito we can then produce more effective repellents that can actually do the job of repelling mosquitoes. Not only that, but by knowing what mosquitoes feed off we could possibly stop the spread of the west nile virus which is problem to this day by spreading a chemical in the air that can repel mosquitoes from towns and cities. The possibilities are endless to what can be solved from learning about mosquito habitat.




Links:
http://www.nsf.gov/discoveries/disc_summ.jsp?cntn_id=116286&org=NSF