Microwaving the insecticide deltamethrin rearranges its crystal structure but doesn’t change its chemical composition. The rearrangement renews deltamethrin’s ability to kill mosquitoes that have become resistant to the insecticide, researchers report April 21 in Malaria Journal.
“There are all kinds of social and cultural things that you could propose from a scientific perspective that wouldn’t be welcomed by a community of homeowners.”
It’s not certain that the heat-treated deltamethrin would retain its more potent crystal structure through the net-making process.
Kahr’s team is working on incorporating the heat-treated crystal into nets.
It is encouraging that heated insecticide killed highly resistant mosquitoes, says Hemingway, who directs the Infection Innovation Consortium, a public-private effort to find new ways to combat infectious diseases. But, she says, “this is not something we can take and use that tomorrow.”
OK.... this is how you can find an opening (not saying THIS ONE is necessarily, but, when you see language like: "we can't really do it just yet," that is a screaming opportunity to see what we MIGHT be able to add to that.
We would just want to get early approval from the fair re: hazardous substances. I think we could.
Kahr and colleagues previously discovered that heating deltamethrin changed its crystal structure, which let it work faster