Disease vectors are living organisms, typically arthropods such as mosquitoes, ticks, fleas, sandflies, and triatomine bugs, that biologically or mechanically transmit pathogenic agents between hosts, thereby enabling the spread of infectious diseases within populations and ecosystems. In vector-borne disease systems, pathogens often undergo essential developmental or replication stages within the vector (biological transmission), or are passively carried on contaminated body parts (mechanical transmission). Research on disease vectors encompasses their ecology, population dynamics, host-feeding behavior, vector competence, insecticide resistance, and interactions with environmental and climatic factors, informing surveillance, risk modeling, and integrated vector management strategies for disease control.
A genomic surveillance study has shed new light on how an invasive urban malaria mosquito species spread from Asia to Africa, potentially threatening public health across a rapidly urbanizing continent where malaria is mainly ...
Ecology
5 hours ago
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In the United States, Google's, now Alphabet's, Debug initiative has asked the federal government for permission to release up to 32 million sterilized male mosquitoes in California and Florida.
Ecology
Jul 21, 2026
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Scientists have successfully edited the genome of biting midges, opening the door to new research on how these insects transmit disease. Culicoides biting midges are small blood-feeding insects responsible for spreading important ...
Biotechnology
Jul 20, 2026
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The choices people make to control mosquitoes in their own backyards may be helping some of those mosquitoes survive the very insecticides meant to kill them, according to two new studies from North Carolina State University. ...
Evolution
Jul 20, 2026
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Mosquitoes are widely known for transmitting diseases such as malaria and dengue fever to humans, but less is known about the diseases they can transmit to wild birds. The Plasmodium parasite that causes avian malaria is ...
Ecology
Jul 17, 2026
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Ticks that survive less-than-lethal doses of pesticide are able to withstand dangerous cold, which could help them spread tick-borne diseases farther north, a UC study has found. Biologists with the University of Cincinnati ...
Ecology
Jul 17, 2026
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An invasive species found across West Texas may pose a greater threat to native bighorn sheep than previously understood.
Plants & Animals
Jul 13, 2026
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52
A new study in PLOS Biology of 133 species of flies, mosquitoes and their relatives shows that most species fly in surprisingly similar ways. Physical and aerodynamic laws shape the evolution of their flight behavior more ...
Evolution
Jul 10, 2026
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144
New roads bring changes to the regions they traverse. They can enable job opportunities, access to medicine and health care, and electricity. But they also disrupt local ecosystems and can have surprising consequences for ...
Environment
Jul 8, 2026
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28
A new study published in the Journal of Helminthology by researchers from the Estonian University of Life Sciences and the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, together with collaborators from Greenland and the Faroe ...
Plants & Animals
Jul 7, 2026
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