Portable and Environmentally Friendly Trap for Haematophagous Arthropods

Haematophagous arthropods including ticks and mosquitoes spread many deadly diseases and pose serious threats to people throughout the world. Current measures only mediate the problem, and no solution exists to stop the spread of disease by these vectors.Trapping these arthropods can be a significant component in controlling and monitoring their populations, yet current trapping devices are either ineffective, or impractical for widespread use.To address this problem we propose to develop a trap that will be more effective in attracting a wide variety of these haematophagous arthropods. The new trap design will require little power, will be lightweight, and will be portable and environmentallyfriendly. The basic approach of our trap is to simulate the human host in terms of the important components that make humans attractive to these arthropods. We will use new methods to mimic both the heat and the carbon dioxide produced by humans. Thisnew design is expected to outperform current traps in terms of their ability to attract a wide variety of important haematophagous species.