A TEAM of scientists in the US has figured out the compounds in human blood that attract mosquitoes – potentially paving the way for a drug that could mask our tempting flavour.
Researchers at The Rockefeller University in New York used genetically modified females to see which neurons fire when they tasted blood.
Only female mosquitoes feed on blood, which they need for their eggs to develop, but they survive primarily on nectar like thousands of other insect species.
However, their blood-sucking habits make them the deadliest animal on the planet to humans, killing around half a million people every year through disease like malaria, dengue and yellow fever.
Leslie Vosshall, who heads the laboratory at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute at The Rockefeller University, said the investigation could eventually lead to oral mosquito repellents that would interfere with the insects' taste for blood.
