Project Title: Combining area - wide mosquito repellents and long - range attractants to create a resistance- proof "push-pull" system that maximizes protection against disease - transmitting mosquitoes
Project Description: Outdoor-biting mosquitoes constitute significant challenges to malaria elimination,as they cannot be adequately controlled using LLINs and IRS that effectively control susceptible indoor-biting and indoor-resting vectors like Anopheles gambiaes.s. To address these challenges, we propose a complementary new push-pull system that is affordable, effective and scalable,and also minimizes risk of insecticide resistance. This approach will offer communal level protections against mosquito bite where host seeking insects are repelled from their intended hosts, and lured towards specific... Outdoor-biting mosquitoes constitute significant challenges to malaria elimination,as they cannot be adequately controlled using LLINs and IRS that effectively control susceptible indoor-biting and indoor-resting vectors like Anopheles gambiaes.s. To address these challenges, we propose a complementary new push-pull system that is affordable, effective and scalable,and also minimizes risk of insecticide resistance. This approach will offer communal level protections against mosquito bite where host seeking insects are repelled from their intended hosts, and lured towards specific lethal sites. We propose to build upon existing data demonstrating that transfluthrin (spatial repellents) can prevent>80% of mosquito bites over long range through modification of the odor-dispensing unit in the odor baited Mosquito Landing Box (MLB) to be able to emanate repellents, and combine this repellent with affordable lure-and-kill technologies (MLB fitted with low-cost electrocuting grids), to create low-cost push-pull systems offering peri-domestic protection to complement existing control strategies. The aim of this study is to demonstrate that low-cost “Push-pull” approaches combining area-wide repellents (Push) and an odor-baited lure-and-kill devices(Pull), could efficiently control early-biting and outdoor-biting mosquitoes and achieve peri-domestic protection necessary to complement current malaria prevention efforts. The work also includes a series of semi-field work to test the optimal configuration of push-pull subunits in terms of position and number of sub-units needed to offer >80% protection against mosquito bites, lastly is small scale field study to test the efficacy of the optimal configuration of the Push-pull system obtained from the semi-field experiments against wild resistant mosquitoes.
Principal Investigator : Arnold Mmbando
Department Name : EHES
Time frame: (2015-07-01) - (2017-12-31)
Wellcome Trust (Normal)
External Collaborating Partners
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