The lab-developed feeding formula could help researchers raise mosquitoes more efficiently for disease-control programs targeting malaria, dengue and other illnesses.

Sarah Kimmerly, New Mexico State University

LAS CRUCES - Mosquitoes do more than inflict an itchy bite — through the transmission of diseases, they are the world’s deadliest animal to humans. Researchers working to control the population of these invasive species need access to a steady supply of food for their lab specimens, and a new meal formula created by New Mexico State University researchers will provide them with just that.

In 2015, biology professor Immo Hansen began working with Ph.D. student Kristina Gonzalez on a meal recipe that worked well for the Aedes aegypti mosquito, which transmits yellow fever, Zika and dengue. They named their recipe “SkitoSnack.” Since then, Gonzalez has earned her Ph.D. in biology from NMSU and Anjali Karki, a current biology Ph.D. student, joined the SkitoSnack project.

Now, they’re bringing the Anopheles stephensi mosquito to the table — one of the species responsible for transmitting malaria. Karki has successfully developed an updated recipe that is not only well-suited to support both Aedes aegypti and Anopheles stephensi mosquitoes, but one that the insects prefer over their normal diet. They named this recipe “SkitoSnack 2.0.”

“This is really personal to me because diseases like dengue and malaria are a nightmare for people back home,” said Karki, who is an international student from Nepal. “This is going to have a bigger impact globally. It’s a new hope for endemic regions that suffer from these mosquito-borne illnesses.”

While it might seem counterintuitive to raise large groups of these insects, it’s a necessary step in eradicating them from the wild. Mosquitoes are becoming more tolerant to current repellent methods, leading researchers to investigate more long-term solutions. One example is the sterile insect technique.

“When you have a pest insect somewhere, the first thing people do is spray insecticides,” said Hansen. “However, these insects develop resistance and become harder to kill. With the sterile insect technique, you breed a lot of these insects, sterilize the males and then release them into the wild.”

Once these sterile male mosquitoes are released, they mate with female mosquitoes in the wild, who then lay eggs that never hatch. This leads to a decline in the insect’s population in the region. However, for this process to work, researchers need to be able to rear a large population of mosquitoes in the lab before they’re sterilized and released.

This operation requires a lot of fresh blood for the mosquitoes to eat. Access to a steady supply of high-quality blood in the quantity necessary to maintain the lab population is a challenge for researchers, since bovine blood from slaughterhouses can contain contaminants that are poisonous to mosquitoes.

With SkitoSnack 2.0, researchers will be able to provide their lab specimens with a reliable and consistent blood-meal alternative, helping to grow the populations necessary for eradicating these deadly insects.

Karki’s paper “SkitoSnack 2.0 - A Bloodmeal Alternative for Anopheles and Aedes Mosquitoes” is available here.

Sarah Kimmerly writes for New Mexico State University. She can be reached at kimmerly@nmsu.edu.