SAN FRANCISCO ¨C Silicon Valley researchers are attacking flying bloodsuckers in California¡¯s Fresno County. It¡¯s the first salvo in an unlikely war for Google parent Alphabet Inc.: eradicating mosquito-borne diseases around the world.
A white high-top Mercedes van winds its way through the suburban sprawl and strip malls as a swarm of male Aedes aegypti mosquitoes shoot out of a black plastic tube on the passenger-side window. These pests are tiny and, with a wingspan of just a few millimeters, all but invisible.
¡°You hear that little beating sound?¡± says Kathleen Parkes, a spokesperson for Verily Life Sciences, a unit of Alphabet. She¡¯s trailing the van in her car, the windows down. ¡°Like a duh-duh-duh? That¡¯s the release of the mosquitoes.¡±
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