About Us
To develop, validate and share laboratory methods that produce reliable, comparable data for evaluating vector control tools and monitoring insecticide resistance, so that decisions about which tools to deploy rest on sound evidence.
Standardised, well-characterised bioassays used consistently across laboratories worldwide, so that results can be compared between sites and new vector control tools can be evaluated and adopted with confidence.
Our current work centres on volatile insecticides, where established contact bioassays cannot measure mosquito responses to vapour-phase actives.
Rationale
New vector control products are reaching the market faster than the methods needed to evaluate them. Novel active ingredients need discriminating concentrations before resistance can be monitored. Volatile products such as spatial emanators need entirely new ways of exposing mosquitoes. Established assays also vary between laboratories: in mosquito colonies, environmental conditions and equipment. Without standardised, well-characterised methods, results from different sites are difficult to compare, and decisions about which tools to deploy rest on weaker evidence.
Approach
We take methods through a staged process: preliminary development, feasibility testing, transfer to partner laboratories, and robustness testing, before formal validation. At each stage we aim to be clear about what the data can and cannot yet show. We run multi-centre studies with partner institutions to see how methods perform across different settings. We also publish our data and analysis code openly so others can check and build on the work. Where equipment is a barrier, we look for lower-cost designs that partners can build and run in-country. Alongside this, we provide training and technical support to laboratories adopting new methods.
