African Anopheles mosquitoes find us by our carbon-dioxide-rich exhalation. But when they get close they turn away from our heads and ___1___—apparently their preferred snack spot.

Biologist Remco Suer believes he’s figured out the mosquito behavior, for his doctoral thesis at Wageningen University in the Netherlands. And the answer might help in the fight against malaria.

Previous research identified odors produced by 10 bacteria that live on human feet and that, in combination, are attractive to mosquitoes ___2___. Suer's work shows that nine out of 10 of these odors are ___3___ by olfactory neurons under hair-like structures on the mosquitoes' mouthparts. Right nearby are some other key neurons—that recognize our CO2 from further away.

Suer discovered that five different bacteria scents, when isolated from the mix, actually ___4___ those CO2 neurons from doing their job. So if the bacterial odor molecule is present, the CO2 sniffers turn off, presumably to allow the mosquito to concentrate on the close-range foot target.

Suer imagines ___5___ baited with these feet bacteria to attract mosquitoes and catch them before they can bite. It’s the next best thing to stepping on them.
【視聽(tīng)版科學(xué)小組榮譽(yù)出品】
dive for our feet at close range picked up block traps
非洲瘧蚊通過(guò)我們富含二氧化碳的呼出物找到我們，它們不叮咬我們的頭部，轉(zhuǎn)而去叮咬我們的腳，顯然那兒才是它們覓食的最佳場(chǎng)所。 生物學(xué)家瑞姆科休爾就讀于荷蘭瓦赫寧根大學(xué)，他在博士論文中稱(chēng)他已經(jīng)研究出了瘧蚊的行為特性。休爾的研究成果對(duì)于對(duì)抗瘧疾可能會(huì)有幫助。 早期研究發(fā)現(xiàn)，人們腳部滋生的10種細(xì)菌發(fā)出的臭味共同作用會(huì)吸引附近的蚊子。休爾的研究表明這10種細(xì)菌中有9種是由蚊子口器上毛發(fā)狀結(jié)構(gòu)的嗅覺(jué)神經(jīng)元發(fā)覺(jué)的。這些嗅覺(jué)神經(jīng)旁邊就是能夠發(fā)覺(jué)遠(yuǎn)距離之外二氧化碳的關(guān)鍵神經(jīng)元。 休爾發(fā)現(xiàn)5種不同的細(xì)菌氣味在單獨(dú)作用時(shí)，是能夠?qū)ξ米拥亩趸忌窠?jīng)元起阻礙作用的。因此，假如有細(xì)菌氣味分子在，那么蚊子的二氧化碳嗅探器就無(wú)法起作用，那么蚊子就只能在它附近覓食了。 休爾還設(shè)想利用這些腳部細(xì)菌設(shè)置陷阱，先引誘蚊子過(guò)來(lái)，再在它們叮咬之前消滅它們。這個(gè)計(jì)劃不錯(cuò)，蚊子們，受死吧～～～