In the United States, Google’s (now Alphabet) Debug initiative has asked the federal government for permission to release up to 32 million sterilised male mosquitoes in California and Florida.

Male mosquitoes don’t bite or carry disease. The hope is these millions of male mosquitoes will mate with disease-carrying females, the eggs won’t hatch, and mosquito numbers will fall.

Unsurpringly, the US public has questions about the plan, including whether the release is safe and will work at scale, and what happens afterwards. Google/Alphabet’s plan is to release more than 16 million mozzies each year, for two years.

More than a decade ago, I led a project with Google’s life sciences division, (now known as Verily), to test a novel mosquito-control strategy in far north Queensland.

The results showed releasing specially bred male mosquitoes can dramatically suppress populations of the exotic, invasive mosquito species Aedes aegypti. This species is responsible for spreading deadly diseases such as dengue, Zika, chikungunya and yellow fever. Given the US is seriously considering this approach, our Australian experience offers important lessons.

Using mosquitoes against themselves

This story begins in 2015, when we travelled to Silicon Valley to meet Verily scientists interested in developing a mosquito suppression technology. Their goals aligned closely with our own research, supported by an Australian National Health and Medical Research Council grant, to develop environmentally friendly tools for suppressing invasive........

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