Achievement

IGERT students and faculty have designed and implemented an ecological investigation into mosquito niche partitioning on the Island of Hawaii. Faculty members Shannon Bennett and Durrell Kapan, Trainees Kira Krend and Argon Steel, and Associates Panpim Thongsripong and Jon Winchester have all been involved in this project. Over the course of the project Trainee Argon Steel moved into a leadership role in designing and implementing a new trapping strategy that reflected a more nuanced understanding of habitat selection by our study species. This project involves a community outreach component pioneered by Jon Winchester and Durrell Kapan, as mosquito traps are set near human habitation. The study has implications for human disease transmission by an anthropophilic mosquito species, including dengue fever. Preliminary trapping results support the hypotheses, a paper will be co-authored by the mosquito team, and additional grant funding is being sought to continue this research.