Ionotropic Receptors as Potential Targets Against Insect-Transmitted Diseases

Insects can remotely detect human temperature, odor, and other stimuli as part of their host-seeking strategy. Such detection involves specific biomolecules, whose inhibition could limit host spotting and decrease the spread of insect-transmitted diseases. In this framework, invertebrate-specific ionotropic receptors (IRs) provide a potential molecular target to disable the insect’s capability to detect stimuli from prospective hosts. While several IRs have been studied in disease-transmitting insects, their inhibition remains unexplored. The rational design and development of such inhibitors requires the detailed characterization of the structure and functional mechanisms of IRs. Here, I discuss a possible, exploratory, and long-term approach for IR inhibition, which is based on research in mammalian thermosensitive transient receptor potential ion channels.