Disruptive technology for vector control: the Innovative Vector Control Consortium and the US Military join forces to explore transformative insecticide application technology for mosquito control programmes

Malaria vector control technology has remained largely static for decades and there is a pressing need for innovative control tools and methodology to radically improve the quality and efficiency of current vector control practices. This report summarizes a workshop jointly organized by the Innovative Vector Control Consortium (IVCC) and the Armed Forces Pest Management Board (AFPMB) focused on public health pesticide application technology. Three main topics were discussed: the limitations with current tools and techniques used for indoor residual spraying (IRS), technology innovation to improve efficacy of IRS programmes, and truly disruptive application technology beyond IRS. The group identified several opportunities to improve application technology to include: insuring all IRS programmes are using constant flow valves and erosion resistant tips; introducing compression sprayer improvements that help minimize pesticide waste and human error; and moving beyond IRS by embracing the potential for new larval source management techniques and next generation technology such as unmanned “smart” spray systems. The meeting served to lay the foundation for broader collaboration between the IVCC and AFPMB and partners in industry, the World Health Organization, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and others

Eliminating malaria by 2040 among agricultural households in Africa: potential impact on health, labor productivity, education and gender equality [version 2; referees: 2 approved]

Background: Ambitious goals have been set to eradicate malaria by the year 2040. Given the high poverty levels and the intense levels of malaria transmission in sub-Saharan Africa, suppressing malaria in rural agricultural communities in these regions will be one of the greatest challenges to achieving malaria eradication. This study has two objectives. The first is to estimate how eradicating malaria by 2040 would affect agricultural households in sub-Saharan Africa. The second is to identify where additional research is needed to develop better estimates of how eradicating malaria by 2040 would affect those households. Methods: Using agricultural census data and malaria morbidity data, we developed estimates of the number of malaria cases in 2018 among agricultural households with fewer than 10 hectares of land for 35 countries in sub-Saharan Africa. By combining these estimates with additional evidence from the literature, we analyzed how achieving malaria eradication by 2040 would affect indicators related to four Sustainable Development Goals: health, poverty, education and gender equality. Results: Our analysis found that achieving malaria eradication by 2040 would prevent approximately 841 million cases of malaria and thereby decrease the number of lost workdays among agricultural households by approximately 3.2 billion days. Eradicating malaria by 2040 would also increase the number of school days attended by children by 1.5 billion days while also reducing the number of caregiving days provided by women for malaria cases by approximately 1.1 billion days. Conclusions: This article analyzes the impact of eradicating malaria among agricultural households in sub-Saharan Africa using indicators related to four of the Sustainable Development Goals. Enhanced data collection efforts related to these four indicators would facilitate more rigorous estimates of how eradicating malaria would affect these indicators over the next two decades

Targeted outdoor residual spraying, autodissemination devices and their combination against Aedes mosquitoes: field implementation in a Malaysian urban setting

Currently, dengue control relies largely on reactive vector control programmes. Proactive vector-control using a rational, well-balanced integrated vector management approach may prove more successful for dengue control. As part of the development of a cluster randomized controlled epidemiological trial, a study was conducted in Johor Bahru, Malaysia. The study included one control site (three buildings) and three intervention sites which were treated as follows: targeted outdoor residual spraying only (TORS site, two buildings); deployment of autodissemination devices only (ADD site, four buildings); and the previous two treatments combined (TORS + ADD site, three buildings). The primary entomological measurement was per cent of positive ovitraps—ovitrap index (OI). The effect of each intervention on OI was analyzed by a modified ordinary least squares regression model. Relative to the control site, the TORS and ADD sites showed a reduction in the Aedes OI (−6.5%, P = 0.04 and −8.3%, P = 0.10, respectively). Analysis by species showed that, relative to control, the Ae. aegypti OI was lower in ADD (−8.9%, P = 0.03) and in TORS (−10.4%, P = 0.02). No such effect was evident in the TORS + ADD site. The present study provides insights into the methods to be used for the main trial. The combination of multiple insecticides with different modes of action in one package is innovative, although we could not demonstrate the additive effect of TORS + ADD. Further work is required to strengthen our understanding of how these interventions impact dengue vector populations and dengue transmission

Two new species of WesternAustralian Abantiades Herrich-Schäffer (Lepidoptera Hepialidae) and a description of the female of Abantiades paradoxa (Tindale)

Moore, Michael D., Beaver, Ethan P., Bradford, Tessa, Hutchinson, Paul M., Kay, Paul, Temby, Nick, Hamon, Howard, Stevens, Mark I. (2022): Two new species of WesternAustralian Abantiades Herrich-Schäffer (Lepidoptera Hepialidae) and a description of the female of Abantiades paradoxa (Tindale). Zootaxa 5133 (2): 201-225, DOI: https://doi.org/10.11646/zootaxa.5133.2.

Effect of binder content in Cu-In-Se precursor ink on the physical and electrical properties of printed CuInSe₂ solar cells

Printed chalcopyrite thin films have attracted considerable attention in recent years due to their potential in the high-throughput production of photovoltaic devices. To improve the homogeneity of printed CuInSe₂ (CISe) layers, chemical additives such as binder can be added to the precursor ink. In this contribution, we investigate the influence of the dicyandiamide (DCDA) content, used as a binder in the precursor ink, on the physical and electrical properties of printed CISe solar cells. It is shown that the use of the binder leads to a dense absorber, composed of large CISe grains close to the surface, while the bulk of the layer consists of CISe crystallites embedded in a CuₓS particle based matrix, resulting from the limited sintering of the precursor in this region. The expected additional carbon contamination of the CISe layer due to the addition of the binder appears to be limited, and the optical properties of the CISe layer are similar to the reference sample without additive. The electrical characterization of the corresponding CISe/CdS solar cells shows a degradation of the efficiency of the devices, due to a modification in the predominant recombination mechanisms and a limitation of the space charge region width when using the binder; both effects could be explained by the inhomogeneity of the bulk of the CISe absorber and high defect density at the CISe/CuₓS-based matrix interface.status: publishe