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Mosquitoes are guided by their sense of smell, but not only. A brand new study has just shown that they also use their vision to sting, and are attracted to four colors in particular.
To bite, female mosquitoes are guided by smell (mainly CO2 and our breathing) but also by their eyes, as researchers from the University of Washington in the United States have just demonstrated. According to their results published in the journal NatureCommunications last February 4, these insects are more particularly attracted by four colors.
To reach their conclusions, the scientists selected females of the species Aedes aegypti. They were boxed in the presence of dots of different colors and were stimulated olfactorily.
Cyan, red, orange and black to avoid
Result: the females went to four colors in particular: red, cyan, orange and black. “When they smell specific compounds, like the CO2 in our breath, these scents trick their eyes into looking for specific colors and visual patterns, which are associated with a potential host, and straying towards them.“, explains Jeffrey Riffell, co-author of the study, in the press release.
Mosquitoes are therefore visually attracted to these colors. And more particularly by red, which emits a strong wavelength to which mosquitoes are more sensitive. On the other hand, they ignore green, blue, purple and white. It is therefore better to favor this kind of color in spring and summer. But this will only minimize the impact of mosquitoes on your skin, as your skin naturally emits the red wavelength, regardless of its color.
So you will not be able to completely get rid of mosquitoes only by the color method. “There are three main signals that attract mosquitoes: your breath, your sweat and your skin temperature. In this study, we found a fourth clue: the color red, which is found not only on your clothes, but also on everyone’s skin. No matter your skin tone, we all have a strong red signature“says Jeffrey Riffell again.
Why study this?
If the subject seems light, it is in fact very important to fight against certain diseases. Indeed, mosquitoes are vectors of pathogenic agents, often viruses, which cause serious pathologies and which countries have difficulty getting rid of. Like malaria, dengue fever, yellow fever or chikungunya, which still cause several thousand deaths each year around the world.