Exploring mosquito behaviors to improve attractive toxic sugar bait (ATSB) efficacy

Mosquito-borne pathogen transmission is a global burden to the health, well-being, and productivity of human communities. There is a need to develop new tools to fight mosquito-borne pathogen transmission in the absence of a globally available vaccine and the wake of insecticide resistance that leads to product failures for reducing mosquito population densities. There are two general approaches to reduce the risk of mosquito-borne diseases including personal protective measures and area-wide chemical interventions. Amino acids are important for protein synthesis, but also act as signaling molecules. Feeding is an essential activity that promotes the growth, survival, and reproduction of mosquitoes. There are different mechanisms for mosquitoes to evaluate environmental nutritional sources depending on their amino acid requirements. This can induce different adaptive behaviors, including attraction, aversion, and neutrality depending on the amino acid. There is limited data reported for the behavioral perception of mosquitoes to amino acids. This study examined the choice and no-choice olfactory, gustatory, and locomotor perception of Aedes aegypti mosquitoes to individual amino acids as a prerequisite for beneficial inclusions to attract-and-kill interventions for reducing mosquito population densities.