The Disappearing Spoon: a science history podcast with Sam Kean cover image

The Screwiest—and Perhaps Most Original—Idea of the 20th Century

The Disappearing Spoon: a science history podcast with Sam Kean

CHAPTER

Screwworms - The End of the Screwworm

Nippling's original idea was to sterilize and release male flies. Releasing sterile females doesn't help since they don't mate with other females. In mosquitoes, only the females bite animals for blood and spread diseases. So if you ran the nippling sterilization process and release sterile female mosquitoes, you might actually increase the spread of disease.

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