2023-06-23 11:33:37
(PHOTO: iStock)
The same problem plagues us every summer: mosquitoes. These pesky bugs are all over the place, biting and trying to ruin our day. It is striking that not all people are bitten equally often.
Shortly before the female mosquito lays her eggs, she becomes particularly keen on biting. She needs certain proteins from the blood of animals or humans for the formation of her eggs, which she cannot form herself. When searching for victims, she concentrates primarily on the gas carbon dioxide, which she can perceive from a distance of up to 50 meters. Since humans and animals exhale carbon dioxide, they are easy prey. The more of the gas in the breath, the more attractive the victim is to the mosquito. Pregnant women, for example, are bitten particularly often because they practically breathe out for two.
However, the picky gnat also attaches importance to the blood type of the victim. 85 percent of all people indicate their blood type via a specific chemical signal on their skin. The 15 percent that do not send out such a signal are practically invisible to the mosquitoes. Scientists led by Yoshikazu Shirai from the Institute of Pest Control Technology in Chiba, Japan, conducted an experiment to research the blood group preferences of mosquitoes. The subjects with blood group 0 were approached twice as often as people with blood group A. Blood group B was between A and 0 on the mosquito popularity scale.
certain odor & bacteria
But the smell of a human also plays an important role in the choice of prey for mosquitoes. They are attracted to metabolic products such as lactic acid, uric acid, and ammonia that are secreted through sweat. People produce different amounts of these substances depending on their genes and current metabolism. Mosquitoes’ preferences vary by species: some are more attracted to the smell of ammonia, others prefer lactic acid.
However, body odor also depends on the composition of the skin bacteria. Researchers from Wageningen University in the Netherlands were able to show that not all types of skin bacteria attract or repel mosquitoes to the same extent. In one experiment, skin bacteria were taken from the feet of 48 men and multiplied in the laboratory. The bacteria produced the test person’s characteristic odor via their metabolic products. The smells differ from each other because not everyone has the same number of types of skin bacteria.
The scientists then released a swarm of mosquitoes on the odor samples and counted how many mosquitoes had flown to which odor. It turned out that they liked the smell best, which was produced by a large number of species of bacteria.
So if you have blood group 0 and sweat a lot, you are particularly poor. In such cases, the only thing that can help is a quick response or a mosquito spray.
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