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The mosquito Aedes aegypti can detect humans through infrared radiation for highly effective mid-range navigation.

The Drosophila rhodopsin Rh7 works with cryptochrome to mediate circadian light entrainment by pacemaker neurons.

Perception of mechanical tension is important for coordinated locomotion, and in Drosophila, mutations in stretch-sensitive TRPV channels grossly impair locomotor behaviour. Akitake et al. show that the Drosophila TRPC channel TRPγis, in contrast, specifically required for fine motor control.

The authors show that long-term exposure of Drosophila to camphor, which is normally repulsive, leads to decreased repulsion. They identify the TRPL channel as the probable receptor for camphor in gustatory neurons and show that downregulation of TRPL, which requires the E3 ubiquitin ligase Ube3a, underlies this change in taste preference.

Drosophila larvae maintain a very precise ability to sense small environmental temperature differences, influencing thermotactic behavior. Kwon et al. suggest a requirement for TRPA1 activation in mediating this sensitivity, but with channel responses arising from a PLC-based signaling cascade, not by direct thermal activation of the channel.

A. aegypti is the principal vector for arboviruses that impact on human health and wellbeing. Here the authors use precision guided sterile insect technique—pgSIT—to suppress or eliminate mosquito populations in multigeneration cage experiments.

The authors identify a high-pH-activated chloride channel as a taste receptor responsible for the avoidance of alkaline foods in fruit flies, laying the groundwork for future research on alkaline taste sensation in other animals.

It remains unclear whether any set of the 68 gustatory receptors expressed in Drosophilacomprise a cation channel that responds to an aversive chemical. Here the authors identify three gustatory receptors that are both necessary and sufficient to form a channel that confers sensitivity to a noxious tastant.

Circadian dysfunction is a potential driver of eye aging. Here the authors report that in conjunction with the core molecular clock transcription factor Clock, dietary restriction promotes rhythmic homeostatic mechanisms within photoreceptors to delay visual senescence and extend lifespan in Drosophila Melanogaster.

Insecticide resistance (IR) poses a major global health challenge. Here, the authors generate common IR mutations in laboratory Drosophila strains and use a CRISPR-based allelic-drive to replace an IR allele with a susceptible wild-type counterpart, providing a potent new tool for vector control.

Vision in mosquitoes plays a critical but understudied role in their attraction to hosts. Here, the authors show that encounter with an attractive odor gates the mosquito attraction to specific colors, especially the long wavelengths reflected from human skin. Filtering the long wavelengths reflected from the human skin or knocking-out the ability for the mosquito to detect the wavelengths, suppressed their attraction. This work transforms our understanding of mosquito vision from the conventional view that vision does little in mediating mosquito-host interactions, to the recognition that vision plays a critical role.

Animals are sensitive to the rate of temperature change, in addition to absolute temperature. Using Drosophila larvae as a model, Luo et al. decipher the cellular and molecular mechanism controlling this behavior, which depends in part on the TRPA1 channel.

Usher syndrome is a major cause of combined deafness and blindness. One form of the disease, termed USH1C, is now found to be caused by mutations in the gene encoding a PDZ-containing protein, harmonin. As interactions between PDZ proteins and their targets are known to mediate protein localization, signalling and maintenance of membrane characteristics, this discovery should accelerate our understanding of Usher syndrome and other auditory disorders.

A potentially common, but poorly understood, mode of activation for the TRP family of cation channels is regulated translocation of the protein to the plasma membrane. The pathway underlying exocytosis of TRPC5 has now been outlined and demonstrates its importance for modulating neurite extension.

Both menthol and cool temperatures activate the cation channel TRPM8, but whether they do so via distinct domains was unclear. A new paper shows that activation of TRPM8 by these two stimuli can be separated.