Silencing the buzz: a new approach to population suppression of mosquitoes by feeding larvae double-stranded RNAs.

ABSTRACT:

Background

Mosquito-borne diseases threaten over half the world's human population, making the need for environmentally-safe mosquito population control tools critical. The sterile insect technique (SIT) is a biological control method that can reduce pest insect populations by releasing a large number of sterile males to compete with wild males for female mates to reduce the number of progeny produced. Typically, males are sterilized using radiation, but such methods can reduce their mating competitiveness. The method is also most effective if only males are produced, but this requires the development of effective sex-sorting methods. Recent efforts to use transgenic methods to produce sterile male mosquitoes have increased interest in using SIT to control some of our most serious

SUBMITTER: Whyard S 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4331333 | biostudies-literature | 2015 Feb

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature