Title :
KOM (Keep Out Mosquitoes) project: Anthropo-philic terraforming and manipulation of landscapes for mosquito vector control in malaria disease management and eradication
Author :
Amenyo, John-Thones ; Jadoonanan, Sangeeta ; Gnabode, Salim ; Tabassum, Tahseen ; Kublal, Aerren
Author_Institution :
York Coll., City Univ. of New York (CUNY), New York, NY, USA
Abstract :
The ongoing KOM Project is researching how to construct affordable and sustainable mosquito-free zones, in malaria endemic sub-Saharan Africa and elsewhere. Mosquitoes are vectors for several diseases malaria, Chikungunya, dengue fever, lymphatic filariasis (elephantiasis), Ross River fever, West Nile virus disease and yellow fever. Isolating mosquitoes from hosts also breaks disease transmission. In summary, KOMKOM: Keep Out Mosquitoes = Keep Out Malaria KIMKIM: Keep In Mosquitoes = Keep In Malaria. So, one wants to re-engineer habitations as bio-zones on the landscape scale [ O(1) mile ]: Mosquito-free zones (MFZ), KOM enclosures; Mosquito-confinement-containment zones (MCZ), KIM enclaves. A KOM (KIM) enclosure is a mosquito-impenetrable wall surrounding an area, deployed permanently or seasonally in a rural or urban setting. The barrier is augmented with a distribution of BTK (bait-trap-kill) units. Mosquitoes can then be subjected to herding, destruction or entomological assessments. Currently, the Project is in the concept development stage, and is specifying and prototyping subsystems: KOM (KIM) walls, fringes: skirts and collars; BTK units; airlock technology for entry-exit ways; and automating vector destruction. The companion MedizDroids Project is researching UAVs, drones and multi-copters as mosquito control drones for vector control, that can exploited to eliminate mosquitoes from KOM (KIM) zones.
Keywords :
autonomous aerial vehicles; diseases; ecology; epidemics; geophysical techniques; BTK unit distribution; Chikungunya; KIM enclaves; KIMKIM; KOM Project; KOM enclosures; KOMKOM; Keep In Mosquitoes=Keep In Malaria; Keep Out Mosquitoes=Keep Out Malaria; MedizDroids Project; Ross River fever; UAV; West Nile virus disease; affordable sustainable mosquito-free zones; airlock technology; anthropophilic manipulation; anthropophilic terraforming; automating vector destruction; bait-trap-kill unit distribution; biozones; dengue fever; development stage; disease transmission; elephantiasis; entomological assessments; entry-exit ways; habitations; herding; landscape scale; lymphatic filariasis; malaria disease eradication; malaria disease management; malaria endemic subSaharan Africa; mosquito control drones; mosquito-confinement-containment zones; mosquito-free zones; mosquito-impenetrable wall; multicopters; rural setting; urban setting; vector control; yellow fever; Cities and towns; Diseases; Educational institutions; Logic gates; Materials; Spraying; Vectors; Bait-Trap-Kill (BTK); EHM; KOM; environmental and habitat management; integrated vector management; keep out mosquitoes; manipulation; modification; mosquito control;
Conference_Titel :
Global Humanitarian Technology Conference (GHTC), 2014 IEEE
Conference_Location :
San Jose, CA
DOI :
10.1109/GHTC.2014.6970335