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By nine81
#4346
General Description:

I really dislike being woken by mosquitos during the night buzzing around my ears or biting me. The basic idea I have is to create a star-wars style laser based mozzie zapper that will work most effectively during the sleeping hours of the night. The zapper will be chemical free, which will make it safe to use in a babies room or for people with allergies.

To understand the method of implementation, a number of facts are required to be understood...

* The audio frequency created by the beating of a mosquitos wings is within a particular range of frequencies - This allows us to target that specific frequency range.
* An accurate point in space can be pin-pointed using triangulation.
* A laser can have it's output wavelength adjusted to effect objects of particular thicknesses (this works using resonant theory) and can have it's pulse adjusted allowing it to be most effective at a specific focal point.

Method of implimentation:

* Set up a room with four or more sensitive microphones - three of them must be evenly spaced around the upper circumference of the room and the fourth (and others added for accuracy to get around obsticles such as furniture etc) will need to be added to the lowest point of the room - at least four listening points are required to triangulate in three dimensions.
* The audio signal collected by the microphones is filtered to "listen" to only the frequency range that is emitted by mosquito wings.
* When the microphones detect a point source emitting audio within this frequency (ie - they "hear" a mozzie) the exact location in the room can be identified using triangulation.
* The correct pulse rate can then be calculated by the main system and the laser can be focused to the exact location in the room.
* At this point the laser is pulsed - which basically burns the wings off the mozzie. The mozzie will then die relatively quickly after the wings have been cooked off if not from trauma, then from starvation... Regardless, the mozzie will not be flying around any more.
* The mozzies can then simply be swept or vacuumed up in the morning.

Advantages:
* Due to the fact that the laser will be focussed to that point and the pulse width can be adjusted to suite, there is no chance of cooking your curtains or anything silly like that.
* No chemicals
* Safe

Disadvantages:
* Cost of manufactrue, and therefore cost to consumer.

Reward: free lifetime personal use of the finished product
By Rishi
#4395
Forgetting the astronomical cost of such a system for the moment, one has to consider the basic issues of location of the insect in space-time. The pest is flyiong around. Which means that it location in space is fixed only at the instant of measurement. In a 20 foot room it takes about 25 milliseconds for the sound to reach the microphone. Then there is the finite processing time for the info from all the mikes to be integrated and triangulation completed. The laser beam has to be moved into position after this and its 'focus' set. It has to be pulsed. In the meantime the insect has moved to a new location. The laser will shoot into space.

The other problem is that a single laser beam cannot be focussed easily. You need at least two beams each harmless in itself. But at the point of intersection the combined intensity is high enough to cause whatever effect is needed.

It is really a star war kind of idea. One would need a super computer to do all this in real time, backed up by a super fast almost inetia free aiming system. The angular accuracy at 20 feet for a mosquito 1/8 inch insize is about 1 in 2000!

The idea would work though.

Rishi
By midoh
#4407
:-?
I remember a documentary about the habits of these pests,in which it was shown how mosquitos can detect the tiniest concentration of the carbon-dioxide molecule.Every time you breathe out you're giving away your precise location to these hungry divils! Thus equipped with super sensitive receptors they find their target 99.9999% of the time(especially when their victims are immobilised through sleep)
Many restaurants have insectocuters for zapping flies.They consist of a U.V. lamp which draws the critters to their destruction,which is accomplished with a fine wire mesh,with enough current running through it to give 'em a taste of ol' sparky! the device is very effective,once the fly has decided to explore it.
Perhaps what your laser system needs to turn it into a lethal mozzie dispatcher is a very intense emitter of concentrated CO2 ,so intense that the mozzie must investigate it first.You could have the laser focussed to the mozzies' landing zone.If he takes the bait he gets Zapped with extreme prejudice! B-)
By Rishi
#4411
midoh's suggestion has a lot of merit. There was a counter published re CO2 sensitivity of the pest. They tend to land on ankles, wrists, and back of the palm where veins are. One theory was that they sense the IR radiation from a warm blooded animals. It is true that the pests attack dogs. Our Samoyed used to snap up the critters quite fast. Pity we cannot do the same!

Do unto the pests as they do unto you.

During the second world war one study was done using the bait idea of midoh. Only, instead of carbon-di-oxide the exterminator used a taped replay of the mating call of the male mosquito, which is a strict vegetarian living on the saps of plants, to attract and then electrocute the cuties when they arrived. midoh should consider a mutiple bait. IR laser LEDs are quite cheap. Combine IR, Carbon di oxide and the mating drone as a multiple attractant.

I do not think that these extras will add more than about 2 dollars to the price of the electrocutors.

Rishi
By easycoins_com
#7692
The posts here are quite old but I just found this page by typing in "mosquito laser kill invention" in google. I have been thinking about this thing as well.
I'm living almost within a brazilian jungle and you wouldn't believe how I hate those bastards. In fact it's the only thing that makes the difference between paradise and here!
cameras getting cheaper and cheaper they could do a faster and more precise location of the moskito.
Astronomical costs could go down with mass production, but I tell you I would pay at least 500$ for this utility if it works perfect!

The "attract them thing" is not so easy as after some research I found out that some chem. companies are working on this for years.

This is not a small buisness as it may sound to people living in summer/winter places on earth!

Hope I'm still here when we can buy this :)

See you!
By Rishi
#7694
Whatever mass production economies are, it is better to work on a 'clear space' device that makes it uncomfortable for the offending insect to enter that space, than on a 'search and destroy' device. May be an ululating ultrasound generator can do the job. The antennae of mosquitoes are quite sensitive and a suitable mix of frequencies and varying intensities may do the job.

Even here in Bangalore in India, at dawn or dusk every person walking in the open will have a column of swarming mosquitoes over the head in most parts of the city. A portable battery operated ultrasonicator will be a boon.

rishi
#14229
In Waco, Texas USA, where my father lived, mosquito's were a huge problem. Everywhere you went you would see back yards with multiple bird houses up on tall thin poles designed for mosquito eating birds.

One summer in the 1980's during a visit, I noticed that there were no more mosquitos and no more mosquito eating birds. Dad said that Texas had genetically engineered highly dominant but impotent male mosquitos and turned them loose to solve the problem.

I'm thinking that they may not use this in other territories because of so much wild life that depends on mosquitos in the food chain? It might be worth checking out. I for one would like to know why they are not using this technique everywhere to eradicate mosquitos. I would think that if introduced slowly enough, the wild life that feeds on mosquitos would adapt/evolve to eating something else?
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