The world is full of wonders: behold, the mosquito
I mean it: mosquitoes are astonishing.
Until recently, all I knew about mosquitoes could be summed up as: hate the little buggers. They bite, and can cause malaria.
But while researching the answer to Ymarsakar’s question the other day about mosquitoes and Ebola, I found myself in awe of the beasties. They are incredibly complex, and brilliantly engineered—like most creatures.
Where to begin? Try this:
Each species selects the situation of the water into which it lays its eggs and does so according to its own ecological adaptations. Some are generalists and are not very fussy. Some breed in lakes, some in temporary puddles. Some breed in marshes, some in salt-marshes. Among those that breed in salt water, some are equally at home in fresh and salt water up to about one-third the concentration of seawater, whereas others must acclimatize themselves to the salinity. Such differences are important because certain ecological preferences keep mosquitoes away from most humans, whereas other preferences bring them right into houses at night.
Some species of mosquitoes prefer to breed in phytotelmata (natural reservoirs on plants), such as rainwater accumulated in holes in tree trunks, or in the leaf-axils of bromeliads. Some specialize in the liquid in pitchers of particular species of pitcher plants, their larvae feeding on decaying insects that had drowned there or on the associated bacteria…
But that’s just the warmup. Here’s where I started to marvel (and forgive the length of this and what follows; believe me, I could have excerpted even more):
Typically, both male and female mosquitoes feed on nectar and plant juices, but in many species the mouthparts of the females are adapted for piercing the skin of animal hosts and sucking their blood as ectoparasites. In many species, the female needs to obtain nutrients from a blood meal before she can produce eggs, whereas in many other species, she can produce more eggs after a blood meal. The feeding preferences of mosquitos include those with type O blood, heavy breathers, those with a lot of skin bacteria, people with a lot of body heat, and the pregnant. Both plant materials and blood are useful sources of energy in the form of sugars, and blood also supplies more concentrated nutrients, such as lipids, but the most important function of blood meals is to obtain proteins as materials for egg production…
A large part of the mosquito’s sense of smell, or olfactory system, is devoted to sniffing out blood sources. Of 72 types of odor receptors on its antennae, at least 27 are tuned to detect chemicals found in perspiration…
Prior to and during blood feeding, blood-sucking mosquitoes inject saliva into the bodies of their source(s) of blood. This saliva serves as an anticoagulant; without it one might expect the female mosquito’s proboscis to become clogged with blood clots. The saliva also is the main route by which mosquito physiology offers passenger pathogens access to the hosts’ interior. Not surprisingly the salivary glands are a major target to most pathogens, whence they find their way into the host via the stream of saliva.
Mosquitoes are a veritable pharmacy of as-yet undiscovered drugs:
For the mosquito to obtain a blood meal, it must circumvent the vertebrate physiological responses. The mosquito, as with all blood-feeding arthropods, has mechanisms to effectively block the hemostasis system with their saliva, which contains a mixture of secreted proteins. Mosquito saliva negatively affects vascular constriction, blood clotting, platelet aggregation, angiogenesis and immunity, and creates inflammation. Universally, hematophagous arthropod saliva contains at least one anticlotting, one antiplatelet, and one vasodilatory substance. Mosquito saliva also contains enzymes that aid in sugar feeding and antimicrobial agents to control bacterial growth in the sugar meal. The composition of mosquito saliva is relatively simple, as it usually contains fewer than 20 dominant proteins. Despite the great strides in knowledge of these molecules and their role in bloodfeeding achieved recently, scientists still cannot ascribe functions to more than half of the molecules found in arthropod saliva. One promising application is the development of anticlotting drugs, such as clotting inhibitors and capillary dilators, that could be useful for cardiovascular disease.
It is now well recognized that feeding ticks, sandflies, and, more recently, mosquitoes, have an ability to modulate the immune response of the animals (hosts) on which they feed. The presence of this activity in vector saliva is a reflection of the inherent overlapping and interconnected nature of the host hemostatic and inflammatory/immunological responses and the intrinsic need to prevent these host defenses from disrupting successful feeding. The mechanism for mosquito saliva-induced alteration of the host immune response is unclear, but the data have become increasingly convincing that such an effect occurs. Early work described a factor in saliva that directly suppresses TNF-α release, but not antigen-induced histamine secretion, from activated mast cells… Unexpectedly, [a] shift in cytokine expression is observed in splenocytes up to 10 days after mosquito exposure, suggesting natural feeding of mosquitoes can have a profound, enduring, and systemic effect on the immune response.
Feeding is not particularly simple, either, especially for the female of the species (on the other hand, we have an answer to the burning question “What do female mosquitoes want?” The answer: blood and sugar):
Female mosquitoes use two very different food sources. They need sugar for energy, which is taken from sources such as nectar, and they need blood as a source of protein for egg development. Because biting is risky and hosts may be difficult to find, mosquitoes take as much blood as possible when they have the opportunity. This, however, creates another problem. Digesting that volume of blood takes a while, and the mosquito will require energy from sugar in the meantime.
To avoid this problem, mosquitoes have a digestive system which can store both food types, and give access to both as they are needed. When the mosquito drinks a sugar solution, it is directed to a crop. The crop can release sugar into the stomach as it is required. At the same time, the stomach never becomes full of sugar solution, which would prevent the mosquito taking a blood meal if it had the chance.
Blood is directed straight into the mosquito’s stomach. In species that feed on mammalian or avian blood, hosts whose blood pressure is high, the mosquito feeds selectively from active blood vessels, where the pressure assists in filling the gut rapidly…In the unmolested mosquito, however, the mosquito will withdraw, and as the gut fills up, the stomach lining secretes a peritrophic membrane that surrounds the blood. This membrane keeps the blood separate from anything else in the stomach. However, like certain other insects that survive on dilute, purely liquid diets, notably many of the Hemiptera, many adult mosquitoes must excrete unwanted aqueous fractions even as they feed…As long as they are not disturbed, this permits mosquitoes to continue feeding until they have accumulated a full meal of nutrient solids. As a result, a mosquito replete with blood can continue to absorb sugar, even as the blood meal is slowly digested over a period of several days.[
And that, my friends, is why mosquitoes carry neither AIDS nor Ebola (which was the original question Ymarsakar asked). Those are blood borne diseases, whereas malaria—which mosquitoes most definitely can give to their victims—is carried in the mosquito’s saliva:
[E]ven if HIV-positive individuals did circulate high levels of virus, mosquitoes could not transmit the virus by the methods that are employed in used syringes. Most people have heard that mosquitoes regurgitate saliva before they feed, but are unaware that the food canal and salivary canal are separate passageways in the mosquito. The mosquito’s feeding apparatus is an extremely complicated structure that is totally unlike the crude single-bore syringe. Unlike a syringe, the mosquito delivers salivary fluid through one passage and draws blood up another. As a result, the food canal is not flushed out like a used needle, and blood flow is always unidirectional. The mechanics involved in mosquito feeding are totally unlike the mechanisms employed by the drug user’s needles. In short, mosquitoes are not flying hypodermic needles and a mosquito that disgorges saliva into your body is not flushing out the remnants of its last blood meal.
I’m not about to cozy up to them, though. But really, what marvelous creatures!
[NOTE: I was going to add a photo of a mosquito, but they were too creepy. They still make my flesh crawl.]
I used to work for the Mosquito Commission… wont say which one.. but i did sampling at night along the jersey shore, identifying which kind, their sex, and ripping out their ovaries to determine if they had bitten, and occaisionally stopping off at the radio station, of which the midnight D-jay would play my request spinning me off as Mosquito man in his mosquito van… lots of strange adventures, like the time i broke the rules to pick up 8 or so very pretty jersey shore rocker babes, the man who drove a bike the way a kid in family circus would do something (And hitting the side of the truck in an empty parking lot, depositing a 6 pack in my open window), sex acts of one couple on the hood of their car only to return the same road and find them on the yellow line in the road still going at it, the free 6 pack from a man who was with a slightly underage and happy horney girl, and on and on…
to quote the Greatful Dead
What a long strange trip its been…
The reason why mosquitoes can transmit some diseases but not the others is that the pathogen must have a special evolutionary adaptation to go from blood in mosquito stomach into its salivary gland. The process is not mechanical and usially involves different larvae stages of pathogen development, each adapted to separate locale in vector’s organism. That is why not every kind of mosquito can transmit malaria, but only one species in Anopheles genus.
another reason that mosquitos cant transmit certain things (unless slapped and can inject very rarely), is they have a peritrophic membrane. this forms around the blood containing it… it also keeps it from mixing with a second source of blood.
there are odd things one can do… if one pulls their skin intead of trying to slap them, you can get their probiscus stuck, and if they are feeding from a blood source instead of tissue, they will continue to fill up till they pop.
they also can filter blood for the solids, and if you leave them long enough, they will eject liquid to pack more material in. the diluted material can contain ebola, virus, etc…
salt marsh mosquitos tend to be the most agressive, and will attemp to feed through material like blue jeans.
if one grinds up the critter, and injects it in an animal, the animal will generate antibodies. if another mosquito bites said creature, the antibodies will attack the mosquito. this also works for other blood critters like ticks, but is impractical for control.
chikungunya, the new desease brought in by juvinile south americn humans can be transmitted by mosquitos..
the reason we do not have these deseases is because of DDT. the reason that other countries do have them is that Silent Springs lies, and such, got us to stop using it and making the stuff illegal, which has been great for population control of africans and south american poor people!
Carson based her passionate argument against pesticides on the desire to protect wildlife. Using evocative language, Carson told a powerful fable of a town whose people had been poisoned, and whose spring had been silenced of birdsong, because all life had been extinguished by pesticides
she was one of the first wacko greenies. DDT was so safe one could easily breath it in and use it without any protection… (And often did).
one can trace peoples dislike and indiscriminate avoidance of pesticides as such to her… so thanks to her, the ones that ARE allowed CAN do things to us, while the one that cant do things is not allowed.
the administrator of the EPA was William D. Ruckelshaus, who reportedly did not attend a single hour of the investigative hearings, and according to his chief of staff, did not even read Judge Sweeney’s report. Instead, he apparently chose to ignore the science: overruling Sweeney, in 1972 Ruckelshaus banned the use of DDT in the United States except under conditions of medical emergencies
and this is why those in the know of the history dont like the EPA (among other reasons). in that what it pretends to be, it isnt.
note that witout DDT, chemical companies had to use more dangerous and more profitable chemicals.
note that the leftist practice of letting their pet cats out to play is much more dangerous to song birds than DDT. though DDT killing insects did reduce insect eating species of birds, it did not do much.
for most it had the opposite effects as wild birds suffer the same parasitic onslaughts that humans do… and all animals…
bird sanctuary that has been counting birds over Hawk Mountain, Pennsylvania since the 1930s reported an increase in sightings of ospreys from less than 200 in 1945 to over 600 by 1970, and an increase in sightings of migrating raptors from 9,291 in 1946 to 29,765 in 1968
so wackaloons beleifs trump good science, and policy
and now wackaloons and moonbats are more prevalent than saner well edumacted people. in my lifetime the average level of writing went from 8th grade for business to 5th grade now… (with those coming in thinking the oldsters are arrogant for pretending to know more… yeah… sure… and who won american idol last night?)
The herring gull population on Tern Island, Massachusetts grew from 2,000 pairs in 1940 to 35,000 pairs in 1970 (at which point the Audubon Society displayed its concern for the birds’ wellbeing by poisoning 30,000 of them, a procedure it said was “kind of like weeding a garden”).
note that it DOES cause egg shells of birds to be thinner, but this means that you dont use it all the time all over, but use it more sparingly… then you can get benefit while mitigating negatives… though given the increase in birds, this was never a real problem.
funny thing is that later they used this to validate things, especially with the american bald eagle and the california condor…
which they then had to give special permission to power companies as their power lines would electrocute them, and today their windmills slam into them…
The science is settled. Scientists and doctors know everything there is to know about the human body, plus also mosquittoes. That’s how it is when obeying Authority. Cannot say things like “don’t know” or “more experiments are needed”.
This is a reference to the previous trend of scientific technocracy, not this particular idea thread.
That is why not every kind of mosquito can transmit malaria, but only one species in Anopheles genus.
this is not true… though wiki confirms it, its not true.
aedes aegypti can transmit malaria, but there are several forms of malaria, not just the ones that prey on humans
P. falciparum is what humans catch
Plasmodium gallinaceum causes malaria in birds.
wiki
Mosquitoes in other genera (Aedes, Culex, Culiseta, Haemagogus and Ochlerotatus) can also serve as vectors of disease agents, but not malaria.
and under Plasmodium…
Aedes aegypti is the primary mosquito vector responsible for the transmission of both the yellow fever and dengue fever viruses.
Though it CAN carry malaria.
aedes aegypti can easily be identified.. (i had to do it all the time), as they are the ones with white and black striped legs.
aedes albopictus also hs striped legs but the black zones are much larger and there are fewer white stripes.
for those that love to worry, aedes aegypti does exist along the new jersey shore… there are about 60 or so species that live there…
Culex pipiens is the primary transmiter of avian malaria..
aedes mosquitos like to come inside and bite you in the house… they are very aggressive. if you disturb them, they will bite in the day, not just evenings and mornings.
most mosquitos are temperature and humidity sensitive
different mosquitos can carry all manner of things. various forms of encepholitis are common..
Asian tiger mosquito, which can transmit up to 23 infections, and are thought to come to england and the USA in left over water in tires that were to be recycled..
i just did some research.
Aedes aegypti may be capable of transmitting ebola
“Kunz and Hofmann had shown that Marburg virus, multiplies in it after intrathoracic injection although this does not prove A. aegypti transmits the disease in nature.”
one of the most interesting things that was discovered by accident, was that skin so soft, made by AVON (i worked there for several years post mosquito teens), repels mosquitos, and does not have the common chemicals used
i have never read anything as to why it works… but it helps make it a common seller for the warm months.
August 11, 2014 NATURE
Can Ebola spread to the U.S or Europe?
According to infectious disease specialist Kamran M. Khan “the chance of Ebola spreading out of West Africa is very, very low.” For one, industrialized countries such as the U.S. and those in Europe have strong health care systems and strict protocols regarding suspected Ebola victims. Although it is possible for someone infected with Ebola to board a plane from West Africa to the U.S., protective measures, such as quarantining would be enacted once the sick person reached the U.S. Additionally, the possibility of fellow travellers contracting Ebola is slim says Dr. Mark Gendreau, a specialist in aviation medicine. For example, in 2004 a man flew from Sierra Leone to London and then the U.S. with symptoms of fever, diarrhea, and back pain. Once in New Jersey the man immediately sought medical treatment. He was found to have Lassa Fever, another type of hemorrhagic fever like Ebola. In response the CDC tracked down 188 people who had come in contact with the man during his voyage. None had contracted the virus.
There are many types of hemorrhagic fever, and some are airborne. But no one is both so virulent and so contagious as this new strain of Ebola. All epidemiologists were taken off guard at the rate of its spread, and all previous estimates turned out to be terribly below real numbers.
I grew up in Chicago and as a kid spending all that time outdoors in the summer, I would be perpetually bitten by mosquitos. What always puzzled me was why some of us were and others weren’t. I was like a magnate for them and oftentimes my friends didn’t have any bites.
Laboratory experiments in infection transmitting actually means nothing applicable to the methods by which these infections are circulating in the wild. I spend a lot of time in Central Asia collecting insects and ticks for analysis if they are harboring specific pathogens, and these ticks usually were full of all kind of viruses, but it tells us almost nothing about their role in epidemiology of corresponding diseases (not onle viral, but also caused by plasmodia and microfilaria). Only real epidemiology data can confurm or reject any hypothesis about ways diseases are spreading. It is biology, very specific for each pathogen-host-vector relationship. No analogy involving other strains of pathogen or other species of vectors actually works. These relationships arise in evolution and involve a lot of special adaptations for every transmitting pathway.
“I was going to add a photo of a mosquito, but they were too creepy. They still make my flesh crawl.”
But it’s the time of year for creepy, flesh-crawling things!
I was like a magnate for them and oftentimes my friends didn’t have any bites.
They like the color red. Some of it is smell and temperature.
The kind of experiments used to develop and refine bio weapons isn’t allowed, since Imperial Japan and the Nazis did them. But Hussein O has been doing some of it indirectly in US hospitals. Combine enough superbugs in one place and you’re bound to get some experimental results.
From semi-tropical South Carolina, I begin and end where you began: I “hate the little buggers.” Their love for me is not returned.
Now I know about a hundred times more about mosquitos than I did this morning when I woke up. I also have O positive blood so that might be why they eat me up every time they have the chance.
I wish I know why our Blessed Lord God almighty decided we needed mosquitos and designed them so well for their tasks. Yep, mosquitos and Obama two big mysteries that I don’t understand.
OldTexan:
It’s a test, part of a battery of tests which all people undergo. Consider that each life is granted a spirit, a subset of God, which endows it with a degree of freewill. Consider that not all spirits are created equally, and that God is carrying out a test in order to filter the bad spirits. This explanation is equally informative when you replace spirit with energy.
I don’t know this, but it does logically follow from God’s moral philosophy.
Your succulent blood is a reflection of your spirit. Your response to the mosquito, or rather the character changes it engenders, will be considered during your assessment.
Good luck! Don’t let the mosquito determine your path.
Well, now I know why the skeeters liked me better this evening because yesterday was the first Sunday of the month and we had communion at our United Methodist Church. My blood was flowing with a little extra spirit today and that’s alright too.
At my age I am just happy to still be having a path and if I need to feed a bug or two along the way I can live with sharing and I hope all they leave with me are a few welts and itches.
I think a little Scotch and water might be an antidote that will keep me from getting any Malaria or Swamp Fever so I am not too worried about that sort of stuff.
Anyway n.n. thanks for sharing your logic.
OldTexan:
I am but a grass-hopper. You’re welcome, mosquito-swatter.
This all reminded me of something I saw whirr past on the infosuperhighway a few days ago so I searched for it and there it was…..
Turns out Senor Mosquito moves much faster than you do…. so hard to swat… and also thinks much faster than you can…
“Why Are Mosquitoes So Difficult To Swat? Science Explains”
http://www.inquisitr.com/1523038/why-are-mosquitoes-so-difficult-to-swat-science-explains/
And
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/why-are-mosquitoes-so-hard-to-swat-9765648.html
magnate – a person who has great wealth and power in a particular business or industry
magnet – A magnet is a material or object that produces a magnetic field. This magnetic field is invisible but is responsible for the most notable property of a magnet: a force that pulls on other ferromagnetic materials, such as iron, and attracts or repels other magnets. 2) a person or thing that has a powerful attraction
i LOVE it when a honest mistake comes out as a more interesting concept… 🙂
The kind of experiments used to develop and refine bio weapons isn’t allowed, since Imperial Japan and the Nazis did them.
you mean in the US… but in china, russia, and north korea, they DO still do such experiments using prisoners, and they still have illegal weapons of such, and more than one defector, including a man running one of them who i keep linking to (alibek), has informed us
Biopreparat
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biopreparat
Human experimentation in North Korea
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_experimentation_in_North_Korea
Human experimentation was described by several North Korean defectors, including former prisoner Lee Soon Ok, former prison guards Kwon Hyok and Ahn Myung Chul, and others. This testimony was corroborated by documents brought from Camp 22 in North Korea. In Lee’s testimony to the US Senate and in her prison memoir Eyes of the Tailless Animals (published in 1999) she recounted witnessing two instances of lethal human experimentation. An episode of the BBC television programme This World detailed some of the allegations The claims have been described as “plausible” by a senior US official
Lee described an experiment in which 50 healthy women prisoners were selected and given poisoned cabbage leaves. All of the women were required to eat the cabbage, despite cries of distress from those who had already eaten. All 50 died after 20 minutes of vomiting blood and anal bleeding. Refusing to eat the cabbage would allegedly have meant reprisals against them and their families.
I also detaled kamera
Poison laboratory of the Soviet secret services
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poison_laboratory_of_the_Soviet_secret_services
Poison laboratory of the Soviet secret services, alternatively known as Laboratory 1, Laboratory 12, and Kamera which means “The Chamber” in Russian, was a covert research and development facility of the Soviet secret police agencies
Currently: Several laboratories of the SVR, (headquartered in Yasenevo near Moscow), are responsible for the “creation of biological and toxin weapons for clandestine operations in the West”
The first democratically elected President of the Republic of Georgia, Zviad Gamsakhurdia. According to former Deputy Director of Biopreparat Ken Alibek, this laboratory was possibly involved in the design of an undetectable chemical or biological agent to assassinate Gamsakhurdia. BBC News reported that some Gamsakhurdia friends believed he committed suicide, “although his widow insists that he was murdered.”
China has been known to do similar, but we do not have any defectors and so dont know exactly what. but from other reports, they have tested things like GM crops on children first.
to quote louise armstrong:
What a wonderful world…
Mosquitoes love me dearly, perhaps (I now learn) because of my blood type. Worse, I react to their bites with big, red, itchy, swollen welts much worse than people around me seem to get — so I have been known to get a bit whiny on lovely outdoor summer evenings near still bodies of water.
Therefore, I was delighted to learn recently that mosquito bites can be “cured” with a blow-dryer! There’s info on this all over Google, but basically, you can remove the itch from a mosquito bite by blasting it (the bite, not the bug, though blasting the bug is also an interesting idea) with a blowdryer, set on the highest heat you can stand, for as long as you can bear without actually burning yourself. I do it in a few short bursts until I can feel that the itch has stopped. Once it’s gone, it’s gone forever. The bite remains, still visible, red and ugly — perhaps more so, depending on your heat tolerance — but the itch is as gone as if there were no bite, and it does not come back.
I have no idea why this works. I read speculation somewhere on the Internet, from someone purporting to be a doctor, that the substance that causes itching is a protein that could be getting cooked into inactivity by the dryer heat. Maybe so, I dunno — I’m just happy to have discovered a means of staying outside on summer evenings AND avoiding itchy torture later on.
Very good, Art…you made me laugh just now. I’m usually doing these posts on the fly, so I appreciate the proofreading!