KAILUA-KONA, Hawaii – Hawaii residents can make their own “scientifically proven mosquito traps using materials and chemicals from your local hardware or gardening store”, according to Van Eden, PhD.

Eden is a retired scientist living in Puna. He has been organizing well-attended workshops on how to make the do-it-yourself lethal ovitraps. He recently presented a detailed mosquito talk at the NELHA Gateway Center. It was part of the ongoing Kona Science Cafe series.

Eden began the March 28 lecture on how to identify the different types of mosquitoes on Hawaii Island, focusing on the two Aedes species that transmit dengue fever (as well as Zika and chikungunya). Eden said that an integrated vector control program is best for reducing mosquito populations on Hawaii, and explained how he has reverse engineered an effective DIY mosquito trap using common and inexpensive materials.

According to the Kona Science Cafe website, Van Eden’s primary research area was surface physics using a variety of techniques including atomic force microscopy. He worked at a number of universities, IBM Research, Microsoft Research, and several high tech companies. He took up studying mosquito research when a dengue fever outbreak began on Hawaii Island in September 2015. So far there have been 263 confirmed cases of the disease.

Here is part two of this video series, produced by Lynn Beittel of Visionary Video, about a citizen-powered science project aiming to identify types of mosquitoes around Hawaii Island in order to gather more data and improve vector control.

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