Arushi Bidhuri
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In the past few decades, cases of dengue and other mosquito-borne diseases have been increasing in the country. It has been reported that on average, around 5,500 dengue and malaria cases are recorded in the city every year. Amid the rapid increase in the cases every year, it is crucial to keep yourself safe with the best you can do. While practising the regular norms and precautions is important, a new study has found that the colour of your clothes might be attracting mosquitoes.
Researchers of a new study published in Nature Communications, following the detection of a telltale chemical that people exhale, a common mosquito species flies toward specific colours, including red, orange, black, and cyan. Other colours, such as green, purple, blue, and white, are ignored by mosquitoes. Because human skin transmits a strong red-orange "signal" to mosquitoes' eyes, regardless of overall pigmentation, the researchers believe these findings help explain how mosquitoes discover hosts.
Jeffrey Riffell, a professor from the University of Washington, said, "Mosquitoes appear to use odours to help them distinguish what is nearby, like a host to bite. When they smell specific compounds, like CO2 from our breath, that scent stimulates the eyes to scan for specific colours and other visual patterns, which are associated with a potential host, and head to them."
This study shows how the mosquito's sense of smell, or olfaction, affects how it responds to visual stimuli. Knowing which colours attract hungry mosquitoes and which do not can aid in the development of improved insect repellants, traps, and other ways.
In the study, Riffell says that mosquitoes are attracted to three things: your breath, your sweat, and the temperature of your skin. According to the scientist, the team was able to discover the fourth clue in this study: the colour red, which can be found not just on your clothes but also on everyone's skin. It doesn't matter what colour your skin is; we all have a strong red signature. Another strategy to avoid mosquito bites is to filter out such enticing colours in our skin or to wear garments that avoid those colours.
For the study, researchers studied the behaviour of female yellow fever mosquitoes, Aedes aegypti, when they were exposed to various visual and olfactory signals. Only female mosquitos, like all mosquito species, consume blood, and bites from Aedes aegypti can spread dengue fever, yellow fever, chikungunya, and Zika. Individual mosquitos were followed in miniature test rooms in which they sprayed distinct fragrances and displayed various visual patterns, such as a coloured dot or a delicious human hand.
Mosquitoes generally ignored a dot at the bottom of the chamber, regardless of colour, in the absence of any odour signal. Mosquitos continued to disregard the dot, whether it was green, blue, or purple in hue, after a spritz of CO2 into the chamber. Mosquitoes, on the other hand, would flock to the dot whether it was red, orange, black, or cyan. CO2, the gas that we and other animals exhale with each breath, is odourless to humans. Mosquitoes are capable of doing so.