Saturday, 6 June 2020

Mosquitos attracted to iron oxide and use magnetic fields as guides?

So I believe there is a better way to manage the risk posed by mosquitos than by playing God and genetically modifying them. I did a little bit of research online about how mosquitos are attracted to humans and animals and formulated a theory or two from that and from personal observations.

I remember when I was young going through a junkyard and observed how mosquitos overwhelmingly preferred standing water in rusted containers than non rusted containers. To me this signifies that they are attracted to iron oxide (rust) and similar ferrous oxide compounds. Mosquitos obviously feed on blood so I read about the properties and constituents of blood; namely the red blood cell. The red blood cell while present in the body carries oxygen and contains iron. When the red blood cell is outside of the body it becomes deoxygenated. I also read online that oxygenated red blood cells are diamagnetic while deoxygenated red blood cells are paramagnetic. So I wanted to see whether or how mosquitos reacted to magnetic fields and read online that mosquitos would dart away from magnetic fields and would move parallel to the lines of the magnetic flux. Mosquitos also seem to follow a migratory pattern that follows north to south and vice versa. Some scientist believe mosquitos use the earths magnetic field as a way of navigating their migration much like birds do.

Theory 1: Mosquitos repel from magnetic fields as a survival mechanism. Why? When a person smacks a mosquito on their arm a little blood splatters on the skin. The red blood cells in the exposed blood on the surface of the skin deoxygenate and thus become paramagnetic. The nearby mosquitos would sense this magnetic spike as a threat and would dart away to avoid the danger.

Theory 2: Mosquitos use the earths magnetic field as one of their mechanisms to finding prey by sensing moving objects that interrupt this field. Animals and humans are mostly comprised of diamagnetic material and in turn would stand out as interruptions to the earths magnetic field. The mosquito would use this magnetic sense in addition to their vision and sense of smell.

Perhaps bait stations that contain iron oxide, water and pesticide may be more effective at luring and destroying mosquitos.

submitted by /u/StevanWhite
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source https://www.reddit.com/r/Entomology/comments/gxuart/mosquitos_attracted_to_iron_oxide_and_use/

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