Monday, December 3, 2018
Mosquito-trapping balloons could help us understand one of the world's deadliest diseases
Mock, Jillian. “Mosquito-Trapping Balloons Could Help Us Understand One of the World's Deadliest Diseases.” Popular Science, 3 Dec. 2018, www.popsci.com/balloons-mosquitoes-migration-malaria.
In the article, "Mosquito-trapping balloons could help us understand one of the world's deadliest diseases", Jillian Mock discusses how scientists approaching their attempts to contain malaria in a new way. In a study of mosquitos, scientists discovered that the diseased insects flew at significantly higher hights than they had previously thought, and thus can travel farther. In order to see how many mosquitos are moving and at what altitudes, Tovi Lehmann and his team released these white balloons, each equipped with a sticky net to trap the insects, at different altitudes in the forests of Mali. The data collected suggests that mosquitos migrate far more than scientists had previously expected, but because each of the 3,000 insects collected was not screened for malaria, it is not yet possible to determine how such traveling affects disease transmission between humans. The researchers hope future studies will reveal how mosquito migration correlates with human and animal travel patterns and with the spread of related diseases. They hope that further conclusive studies may help them discover means of containing and eradicating mosquito-spread diseases.
In 2017 alone, there were 212 million cases of malaria in 90 countries, some 435,000 of which resulted in deaths. This has a massive impact on our world, particularly the continent of Africa. Thus, it is absolutely essential for scientists to put every necessary effort into finding ways to cure malaria and prevent its spread. It is important to research and experiment with this new balloon technology because it may hold the key to saving 435,000 lives in the coming year.
Overall the article was beautifully written and very well organized. Mock did an excellent job of providing an effective summary of the new technology and its potential impacts without making it confusing. However, I felt the article lacked in its description of exactly what these balloons are and how they work. A more thorough explanation of the science behind the creation of the balloon rather than just its effects would have aided readers in understanding the subject. Likewise, an image of the balloon would have supplemented the writing well.
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Ally Bruno
ReplyDeleteMr. Ippolito
AP Biology D Even
4 December 2018
Mock, Jillian. “Mosquito-Trapping Balloons Could Help Us Understand One of the World's Deadliest Diseases.” Popular Science, 3 Dec. 2018, www.popsci.com/balloons-mosquitoes-migration-malaria.
Overall, Sofia’s current event was well crafted and informative. For one, Sofia did an excellent job of choosing an article that was both innovative in its scientific research and had a strong correlation to our studies in Biology. When writing her review, Sofia was concise and wrote in a way that was easy to understand, no matter how well versed the readers is on the topic. Lastly, Sofia did a fantastic job of describing the research completed in this piece. She explained how the data collected from mosquito migration was used by scientists to obtain this data using a balloon process. This gave the reader the perfect amount of background knowledge on the research so that they could fully understand the significance of the piece.
Although, I truly enjoyed reading Sofia’s current event and felt that I took away several pieces of interesting information, she could have built on her analysis of her author. While she did an excellent job of discussing her authors success, she fell short in discussing Mock’s deficiencies. Also, I felt that Sofia could have expanded a bit more on the significance of her piece in the medical world. While she included very effective statistics about death rates from malaria, she should have touched more on the medical ramifications of her article.
After reading Sofia’ article, I was astonished to see the number of deaths related to to malaria. Not only was this hard for me to comprehend but I also was shocked to see that of these deaths, cases can be seen in over 90 countries, whereas I had previous thought that malaria related deaths would be confined to a more concentrated area rather than all over the world.
Charlotte Cagliostro
ReplyDeleteIppolito
C Even AP Biology / Current Event #10
12/4/18
Mock, Jillian. “Mosquito-Trapping Balloons Could Help Us Understand One of the World's Deadliest Diseases.” Popular Science, 3 Dec. 2018, www.popsci.com/balloons-mosquitoes-migration-malaria.
I enjoyed reading Sofia Ricciarini’s comprehensive review of the Popular Science article “Mosquito-Trapping Balloons Could Help Us Understand One of the World's Deadliest Diseases,” which was written by Jillian Mock. There were three aspects of her review that I liked in specific. First, Sofia wrote in an advanced and sophisticated manner. As a result, her review was able to be both informative and engaging. Second, I really enjoyed Sofia’s second paragraph, in which she spoke to the importance of malaria and its effects. In this section, she included many relevant statistics that provoked my thoughts. Lastly, I liked Sofia’s critique of Mock’s article. In this paragraph, she provided a very thorough and accurate evaluation of the article that I appreciated as a reader.
I believe Sofia could improve her review in two ways. First, I think she should have included more evidence throughout her review. Adding some additional quotes and statistics from Mock’s article would have elevated her first paragraph. Secondly, I believe that Sofia should have added a bit more information each of her paragraphs. At times, her writing seemed brief and did not go into great detail on such important and complicated topics. Just elaborating on a few of her key points would have made Sofia’s article far superior.
One interesting thing I learned from reading Sofia’s review is that in just 2017, 212 million people contracted malaria, and 435,000 of them died as a result. I found that statistic to be quite startling and truly put this issue into perspective for me. If so many individuals are dying, the global community should be taking immediate action to combat the disease.