The University of California Mosquito Research Program is targeting Culex mosquitoes, the major vectors of West Nile virus, as part of a five-year, $3.7 million grant from the National Institutes of Health (NIH).
The researchers will discuss their work at an NIH conference on Friday, Dec. 16 in Ft. Lauderdale, Fla. West Nile virus (WNV) killed 18 Californians this year and infected more than 900 others throughout the state.
Gregory Lanzaro, medical entomologist and director of the UC Mosquito Research Program, UC Davis, serves as principal investigator of the grant, "Control of Urban and Peri-Urban Culex Mosquitoes," awarded through the NIH's National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.
The five-year project, which continues through December 2008, involves a 16-member team of UC researchers, mosquito abatement experts and industry partners.
"The overall research goal is to improve strategies to control Culex mosquitoes by modifying methods for the application of chemical insecticides, developing novel methods for monitoring metabolic resistance to these insecticides, and improving methods for trapping older female Culex mosquitoes," Lanzaro said.
Trapping methods zero in on sensory physiology (electrophysiology), flight observations (wind tunnel and videography) and a molecular approach based on affinity to an odorant- binding protein.
The research "is aimed at increasing our capacity to effectively manage Culex populations now, not 20 years from now," Lanzaro said.
Current emergency WNV control programs focused largely on Culex mosquitoes have yielded mixed results, he noted. "They have failed to prevent virus transmission, and suggest that we may significantly improve current control strategies."
WNV activity has occurred in 54 of the state's 58 counties so far this year, according to the California Department of Health Services' Web site, www.westnile.ca.gov.
Members of the 16-member team are:
. medical entomologists, molecular biologists, chemical/behavioral ecologists and biochemists from UC Davis and UC Riverside
. operational specialists from mosquito and vector control districts in Coachella Valley, Greater Los Angeles, Merced County, Consolidated (Selma) and Shasta County, and mosquito abatement districts
. industry partners from Bayer Environmental Science, Montvale, N.J.; Bedoukian Research Inc., Danbury, Conn.; and Syngenta Crop Protection Inc., Greensboro, N.C.
In addition to Lanzaro, also a professor of entomology at UC Davis, the team includes six co-investigators:
. William Reisen, director of the Arbovirus Field Station, Bakersfield, a research station affiliated with the UC Davis Center for Vector-Borne Disease Research
. Anthony Cornel of the Mosquito Control Research Laboratory, Kearney Agricultural Center, Parlier, and associate professor of entomology at UC Davis
. Ring Carde, professor of entomology at UC Riverside
. Walter Leal and Bruce Hammock, both professors of entomology at UC Davis, and
. John Edman, emeritus professor of entomology, UC Davis.
Working with them are nine collaborators: William Hazeleur of the Shasta Mosquito and Vector Control District; Jack Hazelrigg, Greater Los Angeles Vector Control District; Allan Inman, Merced County Mosquito Abatement District; Hugh Lothrop, Coachella Valley Mosquito and Vector Control District; Steve Mulligan, Consolidated Mosquito Abatement District, Selma; Kris Lynn, California Division of Agriculture and Natural Resources; Paul Hendley, Syngenta Crop Protection; Thomas Killinger, Bedoukian Research; and Jing Zhai, Bayer Environmental Science.
The UC Mosquito Research Program (UCMRP), established in 1972, is a statewide program affiliated with the UC Division of Agriculture and Natural Resources (ANR). The statewide programs focus on research and extension in solving priority problems in the management of California agriculture, natural resources, and human development.
UCMRP is headquartered at 396 Briggs Hall, UC Davis. Further information on the program is available on its Web site is www.ucmrp.ucdavis.edu.