WHY do mosquitoes prefer to bite some people more than others?
The answer to this irritating question may finally be on the
horizon, at least for people infected with malaria. Researchers
have discovered that malarial parasites actually make their
human hosts smell more attractive to mosquitoes when the
parasites are ready to be transmitted, although it's not yet
clear how they do it. "The malarial parasite manipulates the
transmission from within," says Jacob Koella from the University
of Pierre and Marie Curie in Paris, who carried out the study in
Kenya. Koella placed three tents around a chamber of uninfected
mosquitoes. In one tent he placed a child with transmissible
malaria, in the next a child in the non-transmittable stage, and
in the third a child without malaria. He then wafted the odour
from the three children towards to the mosquitoes using a fan.
After repeating the experiment with 12 ... To continue reading
this article, subscribe to receive access to all of
newscientist.com, including 20 years