Discovery Of Natural Odors Could Help Develop Mosquito Repellents

sciencedaily ^ | Aug. 27, 2009

[JoeProBono]

Entomologists at the University of California, Riverside working on fruit flies in the lab have discovered a novel class of compounds that could pave the way for developing inexpensive and safe mosquito repellents for combating West Nile virus and other deadly tropical diseases.

When fruit flies undergo stress, they emit carbon dioxide (CO2) that serves as a warning to other fruit flies that danger or predators could be nearby. The fruit flies are able to detect the CO2 and escape because their antennae are equipped with specialized neurons that are sensitive to the gas.

But fruits and other important food sources for fruit flies also emit CO2 as a by-product of respiration and ripening. If the innate response of the fruit fly is to avoid CO2, how then does it find its way to these foods?

[JoeProBono]

[JRandomFreeper]

I have a natural odor.

/johnny

[JoeProBono]

[shotdog]

Um. This is the pits.

[JoeProBono]

[goat granny]

And I will bet it is sweet....:O)

[goat granny]

Speaking of sweat, (this is a segway to another area). Has anyone else been having problems with Free Republic's spell check...When I click on it, the spell check with have every word in the post blocked as misspelled and I sometimes have to go back and forth several times to get the right wrong words blocked for checking.

[radioone]

Fruit Flies emit carbon dioxide??? The EPA will soon issue a regulation outlawing that.