Dr. Seth Irish, Research Entomologist at the Centers for
Disease Control and Prevention, has requested to have 1-3 students to help with
the project described below:
Improving understanding of mosquito distributions for
improved malaria control
There are over 3500 species of mosquitoes, of which about
400 are Anopheles, the genus that transmits malaria. Collections of
these mosquitoes have been made for over 100 years, and most of these specimens
are stored in natural history museums. While these specimens are
available for researchers to examine if they visit the museum, the data from
these specimens (species, collection site, etc) are not entered into museum
databases. The data stored on the specimen labels could have a much
larger impact if it could be shared with researchers unable to visit the
museum. The Natural History Museum in London, and the Africa Museum in
Turverun, Belgium have been identified as museums with large mosquito
collections which are not entered into databases (the Natural History Museum
has over 80 million specimens, with over 10,000 Anopheles in the collection). Dr.
Maureen Coetzee (University of Witswatersrand) is in the process of
revising “The Anophelinae of Africa south of the Sahara”, the key reference for
identification of Anopheles mosquitoes in sub-Saharan Africa, where 93%
of all malaria deaths occur. The aim of this project is to contribute to
the data entry and sharing of the label data, providing a valuable resource for
mosquito researchers worldwide, and especially in Africa.
Please contact Helen Baker (helen.baker@emory.edu) if you are
interested in this opportunity. Students would need to apply for funding from
the Undergraduate Independent Research Grant
to help with the cost of travel, housing, and local transportation in
London and/or Turverun.