University of Arizona researchers looking to zap blood-sucking pests

TUCSON — A five-year study is under way at the University of Arizona to one day control or wipeout disease carrying mosquitoes.

During two years of research, scientists discovered the metabolic process used by female mosquitoes to rid their bodies of toxic nitrogen and ammonia byproducts that result from processing nutrients from protein-rich blood.

Female mosquitoes, which seek blood to produce eggs, can ingest twice their weight per feeding, up to three microliters per meal of human blood, said Patricia Y. Scaraffia, research assistant professor in biochemistry and molecular biophysics at UA.

Discovering the unique metabolic pathway the species uses to detoxify and excrete deadly concentrations of ammonia generated during digestion offers a possible way to control mosquito populations, she said.

“If this metabolic pathway is blocked, the toxin buildup could kill mosquitoes before they can reproduce,” she said. “If we can block any of this process the female would not be able to continue to live,” she said.

“We could develop a way to eliminate the mosquito. It is too early to say exactly how this could be done. The more we know about the physiology and biochemistry of the mosquitoes, people can find a target, an insecticide, for example, or a way to eliminate the mosquitoes,” Scaraffia said.

Mosquitoes are responsible for more human mortality around the world than any other living creature.

Only female mosquitoes take a blood meal; both males and females feed on plant nectar.

There are 150 different species of mosquitoes in the United States and more than 40 species in Arizona, researchers said.