Insect Hour: The Mosquito Diaries

Welcome the second talk in our online series exploring Grand Challenges in Entomology.

Insect Hour will be held every second Wednesday of the month* from 1pm-2pm (UK time). All are welcome – talks are free to attend and open to both RES members and non-members.

Register to attend below, grab a cuppa or sandwich and join us on Zoom! There will be time for questions and discussion towards the end of the session.

* Excluding August, September, and January

Talk summary

An overview of a 50-year journey getting to know, love and hate the mosquito.

• How do they become resistant to insecticides?
• What can we do in practical terms to overcome this?
• Can we sequence and mine the who Anopheles genome to get a better understanding of resistance?
• How do we re-start the production of new public health insecticides before we reach the point we can no longer control them?
• How do we improve the products that are already in use, so they are more effective?
• What impact does the insect’s insecticide resistance status have on its ability to transmit disease?
• How do we reduce the barriers to regulatory or normative guidance to get more effective mosquito control into use?
• How can we get point of use quality assurance in place to improve the quality and application of insect control?

These and many more questions have been tackled, some more some less successfully over the years of a lifelong fascination with this deadliest of insects.

Speaker

Janet Hemingway, FRS, CBE – iiCON Founding Director

Janet Hemingway was Professor of Tropical Medicine at LSTM and Founding Director of the Infection Innovation Consortium (iiCON). Responding to the growing challenge of infectious diseases, antimicrobial resistance, and emerging pandemics, iiCON brings together academic, industry, and clinical partners in a £360 million programme to transform the discovery and supply of much-needed anti-infectives and accelerate their journey to market.

Janet was a senior technical advisor on Neglected Tropical Diseases for the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and PI on projects in excess of £370 million including the BMGF funded Innovative Vector Control Consortium, the ERDF funded Formulations programme and the BMGF funded Visceral Leishmaniasis Elimination programme.

She was appointed Director of LSTM in 2001 and stepped down on 1st January 2019. She was awarded a CBE for services to the Control of Tropical Disease Vectors in 2012. Janet is also a Past President of the Royal Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene.