@article{e96a6accc0414e75ab29680691e51d0a,
title = "Citizen science and smartphone e-entomology enables low-cost upscaling of mosquito surveillance",
abstract = "Mosquito surveillance remains a cornerstone of pest and disease control operations globally but is strongly limited in scale by resources. The use of citizen science to upscale scientific data collection is commonplace, and mosquito surveillance programs have begun to make use of citizen scientists in several countries, particularly for exotic species detection. Here we report on a proof of concept trial in southern Australia for a citizen science mosquito surveillance program characterised by fixed point trapping with BG GAT devices and remote mosquito identification through emailed images, which we term {\textquoteleft}e-entomology{\textquoteright}. In a study with 126 participants, we detected mosquito seasonality with peak abundance in mid-summer (1.78 mosquitoes per trap per day), weather correlations (positive correlation with maximum temperature, r = 0.41) and a diversity of species (15 of 22 known species in the region) in a metropolitan setting. Whilst we demonstrated that the costs of a citizen science program is only about 20% of a comparable professional surveillance program, the mosquito community sampled by citizen scientists was biased towards container-inhabiting species, particularly Aedes notoscriptus. This is the first time fixed-point mosquito trapping has been combined with citizen science e-entomology to deliver comprehensive surveillance of urban mosquitoes.",
keywords = "Australia, Community, Costing, Public health, Species diversity, Urban",
author = "{Braz Sousa}, Larissa and Fricker, {Stephen R.} and Doherty, {Seamus S.} and Webb, {Cameron E.} and Baldock, {Katherine L.} and Williams, {Craig R.}",
note = "Funding Information: We thank the 153 individual donors who contributed to the crowdfunding for this project, and the University of South Australia Advancement Services office for support (especially Cassie Saunders). Prof Tanya Monro (Deputy Vice Chancellor Research and Innovation) provided additional project funds. The Western Australian Health Department are thanked for funding, and Dr Peter Neville in particular for support with project conception. James Wakefield is warmly thanked for his assistance with Tableau. This study was conducted subject to approval from the University of South Australia Human Research Ethics Committee (approval no. 201551). LBS was supported by an Australian Technology Network LATAM postgraduate scholarship. We are especially indebted to the 126 citizen scientists who emailed in mosquito observations. Funding Information: We thank the 153 individual donors who contributed to the crowdfunding for this project, and the University of South Australia Advancement Services office for support (especially Cassie Saunders). Prof Tanya Monro (Deputy Vice Chancellor Research and Innovation) provided additional project funds. The Western Australian Health Department are thanked for funding, and Dr Peter Neville in particular for support with project conception. James Wakefield is warmly thanked for his assistance with Tableau. This study was conducted subject to approval from the University of South Australia Human Research Ethics Committee (approval no. 201551 ). LBS was supported by an Australian Technology Network LATAM postgraduate scholarship. We are especially indebted to the 126 citizen scientists who emailed in mosquito observations. ",
year = "2020",
month = feb,
day = "20",
doi = "10.1016/j.scitotenv.2019.135349",
language = "English",
volume = "704",
journal = "Science of the Total Environment",
issn = "0048-9697",
publisher = "Elsevier",
}