Shouted the headline in the Wall Street Journal. Fact, Fiction or an April's Fool Joke?

Fact - When American rocket scientists proposed the ‘Star Wars’ defense system to knock Soviet missiles from the skies with laser beams, little did they realize that 25 years later scientists would be aiming their lasers at another airborne threat – the mosquito. The Cold War missile-defense strategy has been reborn according to an article published in the Wall Street Journal (March 14, 2009). Now dubbed WMD, or Weapon of Mosquito Destruction, this time round the scientists’ actual target is malaria. Transmitted by the Anopheles mosquito, malaria kills between one and three million people worldwide each year according to the World Health Organization (WHO). The plasmodium parasite that causes malaria has become increasingly drug resistant prompting scientists to look at new ways to combat the killer disease.

Efforts to eradicate malaria had stalled until high-profile philanthropist Bill Gates of Microsoft Corp focused worldwide attention on mosquito-borne diseases, and re-launched the war on Malaria. Grants from not-for-profit organisation, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation are designed to encourage scientists to pursue bold ideas that could lead to breakthroughs, focusing on ways to prevent and treat infectious diseases.

The laser research, funded by Gates, was commissioned by Intellectual Ventures, a Washington-based company founded by former Microsoft executive, Joseph Myhrvold. He’d been asked by former boss Bill Gates to look into new ways of combating malaria. Myhrvold, together with astrophysicist and ‘Star Wars’ architect, Dr Lowell Wood, came up with the idea of using lasers on mosquitoes. The laser is designed to detect the audio frequency of beating wings, zero in on the bug and burn it on the spot, according to project lead scientist Dr Jordin Kare.

Scientists everywhere are experimenting with new ways of putting paid to mosquitoes, with weapons that disrupt the sense of sight, smell and heat mosquitoes use to find their prey.  

• Thomas Baker at Pennsylvania State University is exploring whether malaria-carrying mosquitoes can be infected with a fungus that would act like a cold, suppressing the sense of smell that they use to find people as sources of blood.
   
• Szabolcs Marka, an astrophysicist and Columbia University specialist in black holes, has a grant to develop a ‘mosquito flashlight’.  The device is designed to knock out the bugs’ eye-like sensors.   
• Japanese researcher, Hiroyuki Matsuoka at Jichi Medical University, thinks it may be possible to turn mosquitoes that normally transmit disease into ‘flying syringes,’ so that when they bite humans they deliver vaccines. 

There’s even a project to create a genetically modified, malaria-free mosquito to overtake the natural kind. 

However, one sure way to prevent the spread of mosquito-borne diseases including malaria is to get rid of the mosquito population.

While eradicating all the mosquitoes in the world with devices like lasers sounds like a great idea, it’s still a long way off.

“You don’t need to be a rocket scientist to catch mosquitoes.” says Mega-Catch™ General Manager Mike Bremner, “We didn’t invent the mosquito trap, just perfected it.”

There are more than 3,500 species of mosquitoes, 175 of them in the U.S. Each species is unique and each is attracted by different combinations of sensory stimuli; including light, shape, color, heat, movement and other by products of human activity. Mega-Catch™ mosquito traps exploit these sensory signals, using sophisticated design features, making them highly effective in catching and controlling nuisance mosquitoes.

The company appears to have hit on a winning formula – combining painstaking research with technological innovation, to build a range of mosquito traps, scientifically proven to capture and kill thousands of mosquitoes a night. And the good news; Mega-Catch™ traps are available right now.

To further protect yourself, your family and pets, sensible mosquito control measures should also include:

• Empty any freestanding water since it’s an ideal breeding ground for mosquitoes.
• Wear protective clothing such as long sleeves and pants when outdoors in mosquito prone areas
• Use mosquito nets in and around the home
• Wear insect repellant

While sprays, repellents and citronella candles can be effective, they offer only temporary relief. A good mosquito trap is probably the most effective and best long-term solution for getting rid of mosquitoes. Daily trapping during the season will interrupt breeding cycles, dramatically reducing mosquito populations.

And you don't have to be a rocket scientist to operate a Mega-Catch™  trap either. They come fully assembled; simply instal, connect to power and switch on, then watch it go to work on the little biters!