ArticleCurrent biology : CB2019
Aedes aegypti Mosquitoes Use Their Legs to Sense DEET on Contact.
Article in Current biology : CB, 2019. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 55 papers.
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Who cites it
55 citing papers in PubMed, 139 citations in OpenAlex.
- Transcriptional responses of Aedes aegypti chemosensory tissues in response to volatile DEET and citronella oil.Insect molecular biology · 2026Article
- Chemical Composition and Biological Activities of Croton sertanejus Essential Oil Against Aedes aegypti and Preliminary Toxicity in Mus Musculus.Chemistry & biodiversity · 2026Article
- Commercial permethrin elicits chemoreceptive responses on different Anopheles gambiae sensory appendages.Pest management science · 2026Article
- Gustatory function of Aedes aegypti opsins and TRPA1 in avoiding a natural insect repellent.Current biology : CB · 2026Article
- The sensory biology of mosquito gustation.Current opinion in neurobiology · 2026Review
- A Molecular and Cellular Mechanism for Bitter Taste in the mosquitobioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2026Article
- Small molecules as arthropod kinin receptor antagonists, feeding modulators, or novel mosquitocidal agents.Pest management science · 2026Article
- Gustatory avoidance of fatty acids byProceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2026Article
- Triple-Olfactory Mechanism Synergy: Development of a Long-Lasting DEET-Botanical Composite Repellent AgainstInsects · 2026Article
- Regenerative Agriculture and Sustainable Plant Protection: Enhancing Resilience Through Natural Strategies.Plants (Basel, Switzerland) · 2025Review
- Odor repellency and neuronal responses of commercial products towards Anopheles mosquitoes.Malaria journal · 2025Article
- Article
- Insights into the autecology of Aedes albopictus.Parasites & vectors · 2025Review
- A single-nucleus transcriptomic atlas of the adultbioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2025Article
- The chemosensory world of mosquitoes: olfactory receptors and their role in blocking mosquito-borne disease transmission.Parasites & vectors · 2025Review
- The odorant-binding protein genes obp67 and obp56d-like encode products that guide oviposition site selection in the Asian tiger mosquito, Aedes albopictus.Insect science · 2025Article
- Making scents of mosquito repellents.Trends in parasitology · 2025Review
- A Leg Cuticle Protein Enhances the Resistance ofInternational journal of molecular sciences · 2025Article
- Cross-modal sensory compensation increases mosquito attraction to humans.Science advances · 2025Article
- In the arm-in-cage test, topical repellents activate mosquitoes to disengage upon contact instead of repelling them at distance.Scientific reports · 2024Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
3 authors at 1 institution in 1 country.
Funding
Abstract
DEET (N, N-diethyl-meta-toluamide) is the most effective and widely used insect repellent, but its mechanism of action is both complex and controversial [1]. DEET acts on insect smell [2-6] and taste [7-11], and its olfactory mode of action requires the odorant co-receptor orco [2, 3, 6]. We previously observed that orco mutant female Aedes aegypti mosquitoes are strongly attracted to humans even in the presence of DEET, but they are rapidly repelled after contacting DEET-treated skin [6]. DEET inhibits food ingestion by Drosophila melanogaster flies, and this repellency is mediated by bitter taste neurons in the proboscis [9]. Similar neurons were identified in the mosquito proboscis, leading to the hypothesis that DEET repels on contact by activating an aversive bitter taste pathway [10]. To understand the basis of DEET contact chemorepellency, we carried out behavioral experiments and discovered that DEET acts by three distinct mechanisms: smell, ingestion, and contact. Like bitter tastants, DEET is a feeding deterrent when ingested, but its bitterness per se does not fully explain DEET contact chemorepellency. Mosquitoes blood fed on human arms treated with high concentrations of bitters, but rapidly avoided DEET-treated skin and did not blood feed. Insects detect tastants both through their proboscis and legs. We show that DEET contact chemorepellency is mediated exclusively by the tarsal segments of the legs and not the proboscis. This work establishes mosquito legs as the behaviorally relevant contact sensors of DEET. These results will inform the search for molecular mechanisms mediating DEET contact chemorepellency and novel contact-based insect repellents.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.