Researchers at Vanderbilt University have found a secondary set of odour sensors on female malarial mosquitoes that appear to be specifically tuned to sniff out humans. While admittedly disturbing, the discovery could lead to new ways of combating malarial mosquitoes and the dreaded disease they carry.
Malaria is among the world’s deadliest diseases. It killed King Tut and Genghis Khan, along with as many as half of all of the people that have ever lived. And despite modern disease management strategies like insecticides, drugs and vaccines, in 2015 malaria still killed nearly half a million people….
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