University of Washington-Seattle Campus · BiologyVisionary Vectors Lab
Jeffrey A Riffell · Seattle, Washington
Research Focus
Dr. Jeffrey Riffell's lab at the University of Washington studies how mosquitoes use their vision and sense of smell to find hosts and food sources. They investigate the connection between color vision and odor cues in mosquitoes, aiming to understand how these insects make decisions about where to land and feed. Through advanced genetic techniques and behavioral experiments, they hope to enhance mosquito control strategies and reduce the transmission of mosquito-borne diseases.
mosquito behaviorolfactory-visual integrationcolor visionAedes aegyptihost selectionmolecular geneticsneural mechanismsbehavioral assaysattractive visual luresdisease vectors
Research Aims
3AIM 01Characterize the colors that attract different mosquito species and the odors that enhance their visual search behaviors.
AIM 02Determine the neural mechanisms by which odors trigger visual search behaviors in Aedes aegypti.
AIM 03Test which visual features mosquitoes find attractive and develop new traps based on these findings.
Skills the Lab Values
calcium imaginggenetic manipulationbehavioral assaysmolecular geneticssemi-field trialsvisual neuron recordingrhythmic behavior analysisGCaMP6s technologyopsin knockout techniquestrap design optimization
Output against the department
Publications133bottom 47% of dept.542nd of 1,033
this lab
most publishedleast published
Citations5.7kbottom 42% of dept.603rd of 1,033
this lab
most citedleast cited
Career totals from OpenAlex, compared against labs that share a department. A department spans everything from one paper to tens of thousands, so bar heights are on a log scale — otherwise the largest lab would flatten every other bar to a line.