In the Spring of 2018, I was in the audience of a public Town Hall in the FL Keys discussing the use of innovative mosquito control technologies. I was representing MosquitoMate with their patented Wolbachia male mosquito release technology. Wolbachia utilizes a mechanism known as cytoplasmic incompatibility that can reduce insect populations, in our case…
Category: Entomology
Kill or Be Killed: Mosquito Edition
Mosquitoes have existed on planet earth for nearly 100 million years, and they have tremendously impacted the world’s development throughout time. Everyone remembers the iconic Richard Attenborough playing John Hammond in Jurassic Park, with his signature cane holding on to a mosquito immortalized in amber from the Jurassic era. Now, in the movie, researchers were…
How do monarch butterflies know where and when to migrate south for winter?
Monarch butterflies might be the coolest Lepidopteran (moths and butterflies) species for several reasons: First, they are poisonous to eat as caterpillars and butterflies because of the toxins they develop from feeding on their food source, milkweed. Second, other Lepidopterans want to be them and mimic their look, like the Viceroy. Lastly, they can fly…
ASTMH Day 2
Speaker: Dr. Maria Luise Simoes Title: CTL-4 gene knockout to block Plasmodium infection in mosquitoes BACKGROUND: When the Anopheles mosquito becomes infected with malaria parasites, it attempts to use its innate immune response via a process known as melanization to kill the parasites. The process of melanization in a mosquito is regulated by what are…
American Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygeine (ASMTH) Day 1:
This week I am attending the American Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygeine (ASTMH) conference in National Harbor, MD. The conference features many of the most recognized scientists in infectious disease, and offers an opportunity to present novel data, establish scientific collaborations, and networking opportunities with exhibitions. I will be giving a presentation about my…
PSA: Don’t Kill Your Unknown Roommates a.k.a House Centipedes!
We’ve all been there. You come home late at night, turn on the lights, and you see what looks like a super hairy bug on the kitchen floor scurry away to darkness at 1.5ft per second. It’s the house centipede (Scutigera coleoptrata). Now, before you grab your shoe and try to kill your newfound roommate,…
Creative communication.
October 3rd, 2019 The reason I started this blog was to communicate science in a way that is easily interpretable. So, today I’m going to tell about a time when I was able to communicate science in an interesting way. MosquitoMate, Inc. It goes back to 2017 when I was hired as the Field Operations…
Why the world needs more mosquito control.
September 18th, 2019 The end of summer in the Northern United States begets the spike in mosquito-borne diseases such as West Nile Virus (WNV) and Eastern Equine Encephalitis (EEE or “Triple-E”). Sadly, mosquito control districts and state departments that rely on federal funding are ill equipped to prevent these devastating pathogens from infecting humans. After…