‘Toxic Male Technique’ promises faster biocontrol of mosquito populations
‘Toxic Male Technique’ promises faster biocontrol of mosquito populations
Tags: Biological control, Genetic engineering, Mosquitoes, Sterile insect technique (SIT)Macquarie University, Phys.org, 2025.
A new biological pest control method that targets the lifespan of female insects could significantly reduce the threat of insect pests such as disease-carrying mosquitoes by offering faster and more effective results than current methods. Described in Nature Communications, the technique developed by researchers in Applied BioSciences and the ARC Center of Excellence in Synthetic Biology at Macquarie University is a new approach called the Toxic Male Technique (TMT).
It works by genetically engineering male insects to produce insect-specific venom proteins in their semen. When these males mate with females, the proteins are transferred, significantly reducing female lifespan and their ability to spread disease. Insect pests pose a growing threat to global health and agriculture, causing hundreds of thousands of deaths, millions of infections, and costing billions in health care and crop damage annually. In mosquitoes like Aedes aegypti and Anopheles gambiae, only the females bite and transmit diseases such as malaria, dengue, Zika, chikungunya disease and yellow fever. Pesticides face declining effectiveness due to resistance and have caused harm to non-target species and ecosystems. Genetic biocontrol has emerged as a promising alternative. Current techniques like the Sterile Insect Technique (SIT) or insects carrying lethal genes (RIDL) work by releasing massive numbers of sterilized or genetically modified males to mate with the wild females. While these mated females produce no offspring or only male offspring, they continue to blood-feed and spread disease until they die naturally—meaning populations of biting females only decrease when the next generation emerges. By immediately reducing the biting female population, TMT offers significant advantages over competing genetic biocontrol methods. “As we’ve learned from COVID-19, reducing the spread of these diseases as quickly as possible is important to prevent epidemics,” says lead author Sam Beach.
