Science is Taking Aim at Mosquitoes

The first open-air US study to release genetically-modified mosquitoes, carried out by biotech firm Oxitec, has just concluded in the Florida Keys.

🤔 Why it's a big deal: Throughout human history, mosquitoes have killed hundreds of millions – if not billions – of humans through diseases like Zika, dengue, and yellow fever. 

• ​​Farmers have been sterilizing male mosquitoes to protect their crops since at least the 1930s. But the chemicals and radiation they've typically used result in adverse health effects for the insects, making them less successful in mating with females and undercutting the effectiveness of the technique.
• Oxitec’s mosquitoes are designed to be non-biting and are probably big fans of the patriarchy, since they're specifically engineered to be male and only capable of producing male offspring.

🦟 Bottom line: The intent of the experiment was to show whether these modified bugs could help reduce the number of wild, disease-spreading mosquitoes – and it was a success, according to Oxitec scientists. (The data has yet to be peer-reviewed; it will be further analyzed and published this month.)

• Researchers collected more than 22,000 Oxitec eggs and confirmed 100% of the ones that hatched became males, though the gene that killed off female eggs only appeared to last for around three generations.