Science Cafe Posts - Mission Mosquito
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In this experiment, I will be exploring how geoposition, type of bait, and container size influence female mosquitos’ choice of where to lay their eggs. Experimental design There will be a total of 5 traps. Three of the traps will be positioned at a location near my house. They will be separated by a reasonable distance in the same type of environment to minimize the experimental error...
Introduction/Theory For my mosquito experiment, I am testing how different kinds of bait affect the number of oviposition in my trap. Different mosquito species are attracted to different habitats, natural or artificial, some of which have been changing due to climate change. Mosquitoes are the most dangerous animal in the world because of their disease transmitting abilities, so...
Research Questions: My experiment ran two adjacent triads of mosquito traps aimed to explore two questions: whether the local mosquito species in my area prefer to oviposit in containers with greater surface areas of water, and whether the same mosquitoes would prefer to oviposit in particular containers with varying types of water "bait". Data: After 5 weeks of running this...
During my field study, I observed that I found more mosquito larvae in dirty ditches under an open sky. Based on my observations, for my mosquito traps, the specific variables I chose to control were centered around the quality of water and trap wall materials. I made 3 traps: A deep ceramic pot with mud, water, sticks, and dead and live plants, a cut water bottle with clear water and black...
*Last Updated July 14, 2022 Purpose: For my experiment, I am testing what color container and type of water mosquitos are most attracted to. Background research: During the weekly science session with Dr. Alison Parker, I learned more about mosquito habitats and where mosquitos breed. Mosquitos lay their eggs in/near water, and mosquitos in their early larvae and pupae stages live in...
I am currently testing the attractability of mosquitoes to black and white, with a control of transparent plastic. This could help us determine what clothes to dress in to avoid mosquito bites, and therefore the spread of disease, when going outside. Materials: Three 1 liter clear plastic containers One 1 liter white plastic container One 1 liter black plastic container Five wooden...
Initial Setup I decided to test how sunlight and container size would effect mosquito oviposition both in terms of how many larvae and what type of larvae are found in each container. Testing For Sunlight I found two locations in the same neighborhood with very different levels of sunlight. My first location is a sunny and open back yard (with my cat): My second location is a shady...
As my trap experiment, I'm comparing location, trap contents, and trap container (mostly the container, hence the title). I have 8 traps set up across 3 locations - 3 in one, 3 in another, and 2 in the last. Each location's traps all share an origin for the water they use and the bait they use, but each of the traps in a location uses a different type of container - either a dark blue bucket,...
The last 4 weeks of field trips and mosquito mapping have made me curious about the effect of water quality on the habitation of mosquito larvae in water bodies. So far, I have gone to a canal, creeks, ponds, and backyards. All these places vary in their water quality and mosquito larvae content. <--- The creek I visited had mostly clear water <--- Canal with poor water quality and lots...
After reading the article "Container Type Affects Mosquito Oviposition Choice," I was inspired to test how a container's surface area, an abiotic parameter, may affect female mosquito oviposition choice (Parker et al). At first, I was really curious about how the ratio of surface area to volume in a container affected oviposition choice. Thus, I began my experiment by finding containers with...
Conclusion: Although no mosquitoes were found, this process has helped me understand the methodology of making an experiment and having to deal with hardships and setbacks. There were many potential sources of error both within the system of the experiment and with outside forces. Systematic errors could have stemmed from the trap design or location. The weather was a factor of random...
I decided to test the impacts of fertilizer on mosquito breeding habitats. Background: I live in the Tampa Bay Area in Florida, and a major issue facing our ecosystems is fertilizer entering our waterways from runoff after people fertilize their lawns before it rains. This can lead to major algae blooms, like red tide, which are harmful to the rest of our marine organisms. Just last year,...
NYC is very hot and stuffy in the summer, but also has a lot of shade. A large part of this shade comes from large buildings, but most blocks have trees and there are some notable parks with a lot of tree cover as well. I get bitten all the time in the park when not in direct sunlight, but not so much when I'm downtown with the same level of shade. I wondered if there was something to...
Background: I live in a suburban area around 30 miles south of San Francisco in the West Bay, near the wetlands/the bay. Our county regularly treats the wetland trails for mosquitoes, and they also do aerial treatment, especially in the spring when mosquitoes like to breed. Many previous literature papers concluded that mosquitoes prefer to oviposit in slightly alkaline water; as such, I...
Selecting the right satellite images and products can be challenging! In this blog, I am sharing my learning and experience of working with satellite images for image classification and visualization. The use of remote sensing satellite images to measure water qualities is a viable option to predict and control vector-borne diseases. Space agencies, such as NASA and ESA, provide open access to...
I currently have four traps in operational order. Two at one of my AOIs and two in backyard that were prototypes that I've left up because they seem to be performing admirably. I My traps have been up for about a week, the prototypes were deployed a day before the other two, and I haven't seen any mosquitos or mosquito larvae. I did take care to note that I used dog food in my trap,...
Have you ever wondered why NASA has chosen to follow water? NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope has captured the distinct signature of water outside our solar system. NASA's Artemis program is examining the presence of water on the Moon in advance of sending and establishing a sustainable human presence there. The answer is simple - water is key to life as we know it, including on planet...
What motivated you to volunteer as a NASA citizen scientist? How did you learn about NASA citizen science? Well ,I learned about NASA citizen science when I participated in the 2020 (STEM). Due to my experiences with mosquitoes and mosquito-borne disease as a Sri Lankan, I decided to join the Mosquito Mappers team, where part of the was collecting and analyzing GLOBE Mosquito Habitat Mapper...
I thought October 5, 2021, would be a normal day. I sat in a diner with my family after school, scrolling through my email and sipping a mint chocolate chip milkshake. It had been two months since my NASA STEM Enhancement in Earth Science (SEES) internship ended– or so I thought. Suddenly, I received an intriguing email. The subject line read, “AGU Fall Meeting 2021 Abstract Status...
During the SEES internship, I got the opportunity to do data collection fieldwork. This required me to go around my neighborhood and take pictures of specific points that had been calculated using a Python notebook. Some of these points were in parts of my neighborhood that I’d never been to, despite being in my fourteenth year of living there. I even saw a pack of wild javelinas in a...
Image Credit: Jenn Glaser, ScribeArts If the last mosquito season felt longer, or if mosquito bites seemed to hurt more than you remembered, you didn’t imagine it! Mosquitoes respond sensitively to changes in heat, humidity, and precipitation, and serve as buzzy, annoying sentinels of our changing climate. Here’s how mosquitoes are letting us know our climate is changing. ...
Coming into the NASA SEES Internship, I had only ever experienced science through a one-dimensional lens. I always knew the results, experimenting just to prove existing knowledge. This internship taught me to look outside the box and challenge my preconceived notions to discover new relationships that exist on our earth. Through our weekly meetings, I got to interact with guest speakers and...
Have you ever wondered how NASA develops accurate models of the earth's surface from space? How do we know the topography of the planet, the behavior of the water cycle, or the changes to sea level? My experience with the NASA SEES Earth System Explorers virtual internship this summer gave me a glimpse into the process of how such data is collected, analyzed, and ultimately presented:...
After digging through my sea of emails, I remember the thrill I felt when I received my acceptance into the NASA SEES Internship Earth Explorers- Mosquito Mappers. Realizing this would be the first time I experienced a program remotely, my mind raced with questions. What will it be like, being part of a research team? What if I mess up the registration process? What would research look...
Background Remote working and remote learning presented challenges to us all. As a Master Trainer in Colombia, Juan Felipe Restrepo Mesa faced and overcame his share of challenges when working with a new group of educators from rural areas. Most of the training material and the tests that need to be answered were in English. This, of course, means that citizen scientists who do not speak...
I was excited when I heard that I got a second opportunity to participate in the NASA SEES internship. I was fortunate to be selected last year too. But when I found out that I was placed on the Mosquito Mapper team, initially I was a bit disappointed that I did not get my preferred choice. But I went in with an open mind. In both years, the internship falls during my school year because in...
Co-author and GLOBE Observer scientist Dr. Rusty Low (right) with co-author, Anita Schiller (left), Director, Biological Control Initiative, Harris County, TX, Precinct 4. “We encourage you to conduct your own local mosquito “expedition” and submit photos during the Mosquito Habitat Photo Challenge.“ More details on the challenge are further below.Rusty: When we told our friends we were going...
The GLOBE Mosquito Habitat Photo Challenge kicked off Sunday, July 25 and continues through August 25, 2021. This challenge combines Mosquito Habitat Mapper and Land Cover (two GLOBE Observer app tools) to document areas with and without mosquito breeding habitats using only photos. A picture could be worth a thousand words. But can we use computers to tell us which words...
Have you ever wondered what happens after you submit your GLOBE Observer data? Citizen science data has many applications and is also incredibly important for scientists who are working in the field of artificial intelligence (AI). This is because citizen science observations are an effective way to obtain the tens of thousands of photos needed to train, validate, and test predictive models...
Hi! My name is Om, and I'm a high school junior. This summer, I participated in the SEES Internship Program a partnership with UT Austin and NASA, and worked with the Mosquito Mapper cohort. The goal of the Mosquito Mappers is to collect mosquito larva, analyze this data, and draw conclusions about mosquitoes and their land cover habitats. I started the internship in early June with an...
Hello, I’m Prayag Sreenivasan, and I’m a student in the NASA SEES 2021 MosquitoMappers internship. A big part of the internship is doing hands-on research projects ourselves. With the Mosquito Mappers team, we were to utilize land cover data and mosquito mapper data with GLOBE to study mosquito populations with our projects.The first project we were assigned was to cultivate mosquitoes in about...
Aseel, a SEES 2021 Earth System Explorer/Mosquito Mapper shares this research. This summer, I am delighted to have a unique opportunity to dig deeper and learn more about mosquitoes, trends in larval habitats, and environmental satellite data. It's giving me a chance to expand my knowledge about mosquitoes. Last year, I researched and developed a low-cost and environmentally sustainable...
Paxton C, spent the summer of 2021 involved with a virtual NASA internship, the STEM Enhancement in Earth Science (SEES) Program, through the Texas Space Grant Consortium. More specifically, I am working on the GLOBE Mosquito Mappers Earth Explorers Project, where I am studying mosquito habitats and vector-borne disease alongside mentors and fellow interns from all over the nation.To get going...
Ali Rospond, Museum Education Coordinator, American Philosophical Society. Imagine Philadelphia in 1793. The growing city had a population of 50,000 of which around 2,000 were black Philadelphians, 310 of whom were enslaved. The city was the center of government, trade, science, and medicine. The country was still trying to find its footing; the U.S. Constitution was signed only six...
Alissa S. is a high school student from New Jersey. She is currently participating in the 2021 STEM Enhancement in the Earth Sciences Mosquito Habitat Mapper summer research intern cohort.Hi! My name is Alissa, and I’m an intern at the NASA SEES Earth Explorers/Mosquito Mappers internship. At this internship, we do research, and that research is based on GLOBE Land Cover and Mosquito Mapper...
Rahil V. is a high school student from Maryland. He was part of the 2020 STEM Enhancement in the Earth Sciences Mosquito Habitat Mapper summer research intern cohort. This past summer I attended the SEES Virtual Mosquito Mappers Internship, changing my life. I suppose "life-changing" is often used arbitrarily to describe a great experience, but I can assure you, I do mean life-changing. I...
Two projects have adopted the GO Mosquito Habitat Mapper tool as a way to obtain data for scientific analysis. The GLOBE Mission Mosquito Campaign plays an official role in a research project funded by the National Science Foundation: Citizen Epidemiology: Designing and Connecting Next-Generation Cyber, Biological, and Citizen Science Systems for the Surveillance and Control of Mosquito-Borne...
This collaborative webinar was planned and presented by three NASA Science Activation Earth science awards and the GLOBE Implementation Office. Each group shared a broad range of NASA-sponsored opportunities and resources to connect students to investigating our Earth system using NASA and GLOBE data. The recording is available...
Hello! My name is Faguni and I am a rising senior from San Jose, California. Over the summer, I participated in the NASA STEM Enhancement in Earth Science Internship program and was a part of the Mosquito Mapper Team. What was originally supposed to be a two-week program at UT-Austin and the Johnson Space Center, turned into an eight-week virtual internship, all from the comforts of our...
I worked with a team of four other SEES interns to conduct an investigation into mosquito larvae trapping. We chose to research the effectiveness of mosquito larvae traps in different geographical areas, as we noticed that many of the interns were having trouble with capturing mosquito larvae in experimental traps. Moreover, understanding what type of traps and trap bait type most...
Cases of mosquito-borne disease are increasing in the United States. Because these diseases are directly correlated with the abundance of mosquitoes, finding what environmental variables impact mosquito populations is essential to prevent the transmission of disease. For the SEES 2020 Mosquito Mapper research project, our group decided to focus on identifying the statistical correlations...
Through my research, I tried to find a connection between plants and mosquitoes, so that humans can find a safe, natural, and aesthetically pleasing way to deter these disease vectors. I began my search for answers by visiting nature preserves in my area to sample water, set mosquito traps, and take pictures of the plants. I also used the GLOBE Observer Mosquito Habitat Mapper data from the...
Hi everyone, my name is Bhaskar J, and I'm interning with the SEES Mosquito Mappers research team this summer, in which we use the GLOBE Observer citizen science app. There are a lot of moving parts to it, but overall it's been an incredible experience! One part of the program is catching mosquito larvae in our home-made traps. See the attached images showing how I made mine! Figure....
To draw statistically valid conclusions about ecological trends, such as the relationship between land cover and mosquito population dynamics, land areas of interest must be sampled in a consistent manner. Numerous ground observations of local areas can help scientists gain insight of the landscape, especially in regions where remote sensing techniques fail to measure certain land...
Coming into the NASA SEES Mosquito Mapper program, I was beyond nervous. Living in Washington State in an area with few mosquitoes, I had no idea how I would be able to collect enough data for the final research project, especially since this was the first time I was conducting research on my own. In addition to that, the program was entirely virtual! As a visual learner, I was worried that...
Through the SEES Mosquito Mappers internship, I have learned how to skeptically interrogate the world around us and devise profound questions that can shape our understanding of the natural universe. I came to this internship knowing very little about science except for the basics of the scientific method and the “facts” that we are mandated to memorize in our educational system. I...
Guest blog by SEES Virtual Intern Sweta Alla NASA STEM Enhancement in Earth Sciences: Mosquito Mappers Virtual High School Summer Internship. It’s a mouthful to say, but that title describes exactly what I did last summer. As a virtual intern, I collaborated with NASA scientists and our intern cohort and developed a research project that I presented at a science symposium at the end of the...
You have submitted GLOBE Observer Mosquito Habitat Mapper observations, but are still unsure how to access and analyze that data? This blog outlines the steps to download data into a spreadsheet, describes the data found in each column, and discusses what to do with the two sets of latitude and longitude data associated with each observation. Download Data First you will need to...
In this pro tip, you will learn how to increase your location accuracy while using the GLOBE Observer app and learn why location accuracy matters. How is location determined? By using a Global Positioning System (GPS) receiver, (either hand-held or built into your mobile device), you are able to obtain your geographical position on the Earth’s surface. The antennas on your GPS receiver...
Thirty-one seniors armed with the GLOBE Observer mobile app hiked Kamanaumui Valley at the end of October. During the 3.3 mile trek, hikers made Land Cover and Mosquito Habitat observations, while passing verdant tropical vegetation, the ruins of a colonial manor, a biological restoration plot and ancient petroglyphs. OLLI trekkers used the GLOBE Observer app to make observations The...
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