The project is one of the 43 "groundbreaking" research projects to improve health in developing countries that have been offered a total of $436 million in support from a Grant from the Foundation for the National Institutes of Health through the Grand Challenges in Global Health initiative. Carlson, will work on a project with scientists at Vanderbilt University, which will administer the award, Wageningen University in the Netherlands, Ifakara Health Research and Development Centre in Tanzania and the Medical Research Council Laboratories in Gambia (Africa).

Hundreds of millions of people are infected with malaria -- and hundreds of thousands die -- annually. Female malaria mosquitoes "smell" with specialized receptors in their antennae and are drawn to particular human odors that say "dinner." After biting, while the mosquito feeds on blood that is needed for its egg production, parasites from the mosquito enter and infect the human. When an infected person is bitten again, the parasite can be transmitted to an uninfected mosquito and spread further.

The specific aim of the project is to reduce the population of malaria transmitting mosquitoes by identifying effective "perfumes" that act as attractants to traps or as mosquito repellents. Scientists at Yale and Vanderbilt will identify odors that act on mosquito receptors and create the "perfumes," and the Dutch researchers will study the mosquito behaviours that the odors elicit. Odorant blends giving the strongest reaction (at
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Contact: Janet Rettig Emanuel
janet.emanuel@yale.edu
203-432-2157
Yale University
30-Jun-2005