Bedbug bait and trap invented by Simon Fraser University scientists | Hacker News Reader

Bedbug bait and trap invented by Simon Fraser University scientists

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62 pointsWyndsage33 comments

I'm surprised blood alone (perhaps heated to body temperature) doesn't attract them.

I expect in the next decade or so, sensors and microrobotics will become good and cheap enough that mechanical pest control will outcompete chemical: finding and squashing the bugs with inhuman reach, patience and thoroughness. Of course the tiny exterma-drones may be pretty creepy-looking, themselves.

I could picture one implementation being a skirt/kill-zone around a bed, such that any bug that feeds is definitively killed before it can return to nesting/breeding spots. So the customer is still the bait... but they quickly win a war of attrition against any local bug population, unless it's being replenished from elsewhere.

Most living animals aren't usually bleeding because many predators are highly attuned to that smell, so kissing bugs, bed bugs, mosquitos and other parasites had to evolve other correlative signal receptors including IR, CO2, etc.

I'm surprised there haven't been kickstarters for little robotic bug killers yet. The processors and sensors are getting powerful enough, and within the right power band, that the premise of having a stabby little anti-bug device (a small roomba that kills) is within reach.

Of course, then we'll make them larger. And larger. And eventually it will spell our doom.

>Of course, then we'll make them larger. And larger. And eventually it will spell our doom. //

I thought that we'd make them smaller and smaller ... and that will spell our doom.

Perhaps the bug killing squads of nanobots mutate - either by a human introduced [computer] virus or for a more ironic twist from a source that would normally be a DNA mutator (cosmic ray radiation say). The bugs will then hunt out not pathogens but something useful like human nerve cells or white blood cells. Caught in an international crisis - war or famine, you choose - humanity will have it's eyes off the ball until too late.

There must be Sci-Fi of this.

Aside: is there a rule akin to Rule 34, perhaps Rule 0100011, that says no matter how outlandish a distopian future scenario is that it is nonetheless already a feature in the plot of a Sci-Fi work?

We all but wiped out bedbugs in the 40's and 50's using DDT.

I find the short history of DDT fascinating - in two decades, we eliminated Typhus in Europe, went from 2.5 million cases of malaria in Ceylon, Sri Lanka in 1948 to 17 in 1963, we essentially eliminated bed bugs in the US and Canada, wiped most of Dengue fever out out the South Pacific...

Then DDT started getting banned after Silent Spring was published and the environmental movement kicked off. Malaria cases went back up to 2.8 million in Sri Lanka in 1969 and a lot of its effects were reversed. It took longer for bed bugs to come back because they don't spread as quickly as their flying counterparts.

I'm not a scientist in this field and I don't feel like I can comment on the validity of differing studies about the safety of DDT or its ecological effects. However, I think it's undoubtedly true that in many countries, malaria and dengue and typhus and all sorts of diseases were more of a concern than cancer (and still are). DDT saved millions of lives in the short span of time it was used.

To me, this makes the public health questions of the DDT ban incredibly interesting - if you have something that might cause cancer and kill some innocent people but at the same time use it to eliminate disease vectors and probably save more people in the long run, do you keep using it?

The Problem is that DDT got mich less effective very quickly due to resistance. Thus the cost/benefit ratio was foreseeably ever worsening. If eridication can not be achieved in under 10 years with DDT it will basically never happen.

You make some good points, but you're missing some keys facts about why it was banned and why most people today don't really care that it's banned. This is a good read on the topic: http://www.worldwatch.org/node/517

tldr: DDT is extremely dangerous because it is fat soluble, which means it accumulates up the food chain. It has been linked to all sorts of potential problems, both ecological and to human-health. The question of malaria is moot, mosquitos quickly developed a resistance to it. You can mitigate malaria with other means, such as bednets.

edit: specifically to your point, this is the relevant part (i.e. why it wasn't that controversial):

> The campaign managers knew that in mosquitoes, regular exposure to DDT tended to produce widespread resistance in four to seven years. Since it took three years to clear malaria from a human population, that didn't leave a lot of leeway for the eradication effort. As it turned out, the logistics simply couldn't be made to work in large, heavily infested areas with high human populations, poor housing and roads, and generally minimal infrastructure. In 1969, the campaign was abandoned

Sure - just like mercury, it accumulates up the chain.

Just to be clear, I'm certainly not arguing that DDT is an end-all for all our pest problems. Again, I'm not a scientist. I'm just saying it has an interesting history! Nowadays, I think the modern approach is to treat it as another tool in our toolbox against malaria. This is a good article that discusses that: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/06...

The WHO continues to endorse the use of DDT in malaria control:

http://www.who.int/malaria/publications/atoz/who_htm_gmp_201...

2. Why is DDT still recommended?

2.1 Efficacy and effectiveness of DDT

DDT has several characteristics that are of particular relevance in malaria vector control. Among the 12 insecticides currently recommended for this intervention, DDT is the one with the longest residual efficacy when sprayed on walls and ceilings (6–12 months depending on dosage and nature of substrate).

In similar conditions, other insecticides have a much shorter residual efficacy (pyrethroids: 3–6 months; organophosphates and carbamates: 2–6 months). Depending on the duration of the transmission season, the use of DDT alternatives might require more than two spray cycles per year, which would be very difficult (if not impossible) to achieve and sustain in most settings.

DDT has a spatial repellency and an irritant effect on malaria vectors that strongly limit human-vector contact. Vector mosquitoes that are not directly killed by DDT are repelled and obliged to feed and rest outdoors, which contributes to effective disease-transmission control.

But only for indoor spraying:

> WHO recommends DDT only for indoor residual spraying. Countries can use DDT for as long as necessary, in the quantity needed, provided that the guidelines and recommendations of WHO and the Stockholm Convention are all met...

The article I linked to discusses indoor spraying and supports it. They argue though that the primary use of DDT in Africa has been agricultural spraying, which is why the resistance formed (and which is what most people oppose).

You said why it was banned, The question of malaria is moot and In 1969, the campaign was abandoned.

It was worth clarifying.

How long will it take for the bedbugs to mutate so they are no longer attracted to the trap?

Shouldn't it rather be (if I understand Darwin correclty):

How long will it take for the ones that are attracted to the trap to have their population reduced enough so that the ones who are not attracted can spread their genes more efficiently

Probably a distinction that is not conversationally useful.

I feel like this statement could get used a lot on HN.

I don't know, I feel like understanding Darwin and Evolution is pretty important whatever the discussion you are in. It seems like 11 people agree with me as well.

If all bed bugs are attracted to the trap, then a mutation would have to occur.

attraction and entrapment are not perfectly corelated.

More like: if all bed bugs are attracted to the trap, then no more bed bugs.

These suckers bullied us for thousands of years, but now humankind has this crazy lady on its team so they finally get what they asked for.

Such an act of dedication to science how they accomplished "feeding the horde".

I wonder if they use the nanostructure of bean leafs [1] to entrap the bedbugs

[1] http://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/10/science/earth/how-a-leafy-...

Relevant HN discussion on the 'itch that nobody can scratch' refered to in a story on Medium: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8769925. That story is about Morgellons, for which some explanations refer to the presence of beg bugs or mites.

"Unfortunately, this means Regine Gries is still feeding the bedbug colony every week."

--Shudders

Approximately 400 bugs in the colony if you do the math. 180k bites, 8 years, fed weekly.

No we cannot just simply erase bedbugs from existence. They are essential evolutionary factor of humans. How shall developers scratch their own itch with no bedbugs?

Similarly to mosquitoes, bedbugs serve no nessesary propose in the food chain that couldn't be immediately fulfilled and replaced over-night. Bedbugs could indeed be "erased".

Interestingly, all life and "life" (virii, prions) serve the purpose of increasing entropy of the universe faster. But from an anthropocentric perspective, they're as useful as cancer.

You are starting to get it. Examining "life" from antropocentric perspective could be very misleading. Especially when humans are getting practical means of decreasing biodiversity by erasing species. Even if these are bedbugs. Imagine anti-cancer treatment from some bedbug spit. Could be useful. But once you erased bugs, there will be no one.

Homo sapiens sapiens inadvertently or deliberately kill every creature to extinction that isn't cute... Hence dodo and river dolphins (baiji / 白鱀豚). Not to mention the multibillion dollar hocus pocus trades in ivory and other rare animal parts.

Stupidity is the default condition, wisdom takes thinking ahead.

Problem is, humans are not the first intelligent species on this planet. Others are only tolerating us, and I do not know to what threshold.

You are not a biologist and your mistake is obvious. Mosqitoes larvae are extremely important part of the food chain, especially in lake and river ecosystems. When it comes to bedbugs, the answer is not that obvious. I do not understand people downvoting me. Had they read something about evolution? Bedbugs and humans successfully co-existed for thousands of years. There may be some important perk we shall all miss if we'll just erase them. We just do not know it yet.

> Mosqitoes larvae are extremely important part of the food chain, especially in lake and river ecosystems.

This is less certain that you're letting on;

http://www.nature.com/news/2010/100721/full/466432a.html

> There may be some important perk we shall all miss if we'll just erase them. We just do not know it yet.

Probably true, but I'd argue whatever it is, it would be better to eliminate mosquitoes and save millions of lives annually if we had the capability.

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