The U.S.’s first open-air genetically modified mosquitoes have taken flight
The U.S.’s first open-air genetically modified mosquitoes have taken flight
Tags: Aedes, Dengue, Genetic biocontrol, Genetically modified mosquitoes, North America, Oxitec, Sterile insect technique (SIT)S. Milius, Science News, 2021.
The first genetically modified mosquitoes that will be allowed to fly free outdoors in the United States have started reaching the age for mating in the Florida Keys. In a test of the biotech company Oxitec’s GM male mosquitoes for pest control, these Aedes aegypti started growing from tiny eggs set out in toaster-sized, hexagonal boxes on suburban private properties in late April. On May 12, experiment monitors confirmed that males had matured enough to start flying off on their own to court American female mosquitoes. This short-term Florida experiment marks the first outdoor test in the United States of a strain of GM male mosquitoes as a highly targeted pest control strategy. This strain is engineered to shrink local populations of Ae. aegypti, a mosquito species that spreads dengue and Zika (SN: 7/29/16). That could start happening now that the GM mosquitoes have reached mating age because their genetics makes them such terrible choices as dads.
