Yes, you read that right: Google's mosquitoes have been built to try to reduce the population and stop any diseases carried by insects.
It may sound like a hoax, but it's true. Alphabet 's biotechnology arm Verily, formerly known as Google Life Sciences, said last week that its Debug program, an initiative to reduce the number of disease-carrying mosquitoes around the world, is now ready for testing.
The Debug Fresno field trial , which will be conducted in California in partnership with the Fresno County Consolidated Mosquito Abatement (CMAD), will begin today and will test methods to reduce the population of the Aedes aegypti mosquito, which carries diseases such as Zika, dengue fever and chikungunya.
The invasive mosquito species first appeared in Fresno in 2013, but no cases of the aforementioned diseases have yet been reported.
To address the issue, Verily will release at least one million sterile male mosquitoes each week in Fresno. The insects have been “treated” with Wolbachia, a naturally occurring bacteria that prevents males from producing eggs and females from developing and hatching.
Male Aedes aegypti mosquitoes infected with Wolbachia were first released into the country in 2016 due to the efforts of CMAD and MosquitoMate, but Verily says that with the addition of automated mosquito production, due to algorithms and software it developed, it was able to increase the volume of male mosquitoes by 25 times more than before.
According to the company, the “automated mass-rearing and sex-selection processes” developed make it possible to release one million insects per week.
Additionally, ground-based release devices allow for the release of mosquitoes in a “uniform and targeted manner” during the breeding season.
Once the release is complete, the Verily team will compare the adult population and egg hatching in the test areas with neighboring areas.
As for residents concerned about a sudden increase in mosquitoes during the tests, it's worth noting that males do not bite and do not transmit disease to humans.
Watch the project presentation video
