Heat waves spur the action of mosquitoes
The control of mosquito-borne diseases may enter an uncertain scenario in the coming years due to climate change. So far multiple strains of the Wolbachia bacterium have already been transferred to various species of Aedes mosquitoes and have been tested in Latin America, Asia and Oceania, mainly with the wMel bacterium strain.. The work published by Nature Climate Change suggests that, in the short term, the increasingly frequent scenarios of high heat waves could reduce the effectiveness of wMel.
Everything you need to know about mosquitoes and their repellents
Why a bacterium to stop mosquitoes? From the US national public health agency, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, it is explained that Wolbachia is a common type of bacteria found in insects.. About six in 10 of all types of insects in the world, such as bees, beetles, and butterflies, naturally carry this pathogen.
The advantage that the researchers found in the bacteria is that it cannot cause diseases in other living beings.. In the US, the use of Wolbachia mosquitoes is regulated by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).. Before mosquitoes carrying the bacteria are released into an area, the EPA must grant an Experimental Use Permit (EUP).
In Europe, this natural biocide is also used to combat the risks of the settlement of disease-transmitting mosquitoes.. An example in Spain is collected by the Spanish Journal of Public Health, in a recent issue. Here we detail the presence of Aedes albopictus, with a high health and social impact, detected in Valencia in 2015 and the use of innovative tools for its control, including the use of the endosymbiotic bacterium Wolbachia pipientis.
In the work now published in the group's journal Nature, Váleri Vásquez and his colleagues from the Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science have integrated data on how temperature affects wMel in an environment into a mosquito population dynamics model. of laboratory together with projections of the severity of future heat waves in different scenarios. For this they have chosen Cairns, Australia and the city of Nha Trang, in Vietnam, where field tests had been carried out successfully in the use of this biocide.. In both locations, they carried out intervention simulations using climate projections from Phase 5 of the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project and historical temperature records from those areas.
The result of the analysis showed that, although the technology is robust against projected climate change in the short term (2030), the future is less rosy and there is a potential vulnerability of the wMel technology under high temperature variability and climate change. What is expected in the coming decades?. The authors project that heat waves in the 2050s may last longer (an average of 24 days), which has a negative effect on wMel. In any case, the researcher indicates that more studies are needed to accurately delimit the wMel thresholds.