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How You Can Have Mosquito Vision

Sep 15, 2011  By Shawn Powers
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If you've ever been outside on a summer night, then come indoors to find you've been attacked by bloodthirsty mosquitoes, you know that those little buggers must be able to see in the dark. In fact, mosquitoes use infrared light to hone in on our body's heat in order to find our juicy bits.

Infrared light also is the same light that most television remote controls use for sending signals. If you've ever tried to troubleshoot a nonworking remote, you know it's frustrating that you can't see if the remote is "lighting up". Although it's difficult to convince a mosquito to tell you if your remote is working, it is possible to convince your cell phone, or any other digital camera, to do so.

Simply look at the infrared emitter at the business end of your remote through the view-screen of your favorite digital camera (or phone). If the remote is working, you'll see the light it's giving off very clearly. It works well and is much easier than training mosquitoes!

______________________

Shawn Powers is an Associate Editor for Linux Journal. You might find him chatting on the IRC channel, or Twitter

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I was trying to figure

Anonymous's picture
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Fri, 09/23/2011 - 14:14.

I was trying to figure whether a television remote-control was working. You provided a solution. Thank you.

and here i thought...

Anonymous's picture
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Mon, 09/19/2011 - 16:30.

...they were attracted to CO2. I guess all the makers of the CO2 mosquito traps are worthless and we should just set up heaters.

bimodal

Anonymous's picture
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Thu, 09/22/2011 - 01:40.

My understanding is that long distance they track CO2, short distance they use IR.

When will Linux Journal

Anonymous's picture
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Mon, 09/19/2011 - 08:28.

When will Linux Journal finally kill the post adds that appear on every article with comments?

I knew those suckers had some hidden skills

samqdos's picture
Submitted by samqdos (not verified) on Thu, 09/15/2011 - 12:31.

infrared sucking abilities, sooo not right for us... humans :)

Thermal imaging infra-red

Anonymous's picture
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Thu, 09/15/2011 - 11:03.

Thermal imaging infra-red (long wave IR) and remote control (near infra-red) infra-red are of different bands. CMOS sensors in cameras are capable of picking up those from remote controls but not thermal images. Even so, many cameras now also include a IR-cut filter before their CMOS sensor, thus.. it might not work. The same applies for mosquitos, I don't think their sensors can pick up NIR.

Cheers

Just a side note on IR

Anonymous's picture
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Thu, 09/15/2011 - 11:02.

Thermal imaging infra-red (long wave IR) and remote control (near infra-red) infra-red are of different bands. CMOS sensors in cameras are capable of picking up those from remote controls but not thermal images. Even so, many cameras now also include a IR-cut filter before their CMOS sensor, thus.. it might not work. The same applies for mosquitos, I don't think their sensors can pick up NIR.

Cheers

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