Hannah Chin

He says the reason DEET generally works is because it repels mosquitoes.

We just know they don't like it for some reason or another.

Here's the thing.

Previous research shows that repeatedly exposing mosquitoes to DEET made them less repelled by it.

And Clement and his colleagues wanted to take it a step further and find out if mosquitoes could learn to actually be attracted to DEET.

And the researchers used the same concept, but instead of a bell, they used the smell of deet.

And as a reward, they used a bag of blood or sugar that the mosquitoes could bite and feed on.

This study shows it's possible for mosquitoes to learn to be attracted to DEET.

And that surprised Eliafifi.

He's an entomologist and a neuroscientist at Drexel University.

He wasn't involved in the study.

But he pointed out that it's unclear whether this sort of thing could happen in the wild.

Because remember, this required a lot of training mosquitoes.

And usually wild, untrained mosquitoes will fly away from DEET.

Speaking of which, on the app, we've got podcasts, broadcasts, digital stories, a bunch of stuff to help you know what's going on with the world and keep up with the news.

So download the NPR app and sign up for push notifications so you can know when the latest Shortwave episode drops.

I'm Regina Barber.

And I'm Hannah Shin.

Thanks for listening to Shortwave, the science podcast from NPR.

That's because these days, Barry's thoughts are much more consumed by a shift in his daily life.