The host-vector-parasite interaction offers a clear illustration of the adaptive value of biological rhythms. In this review, we summarise some of the information currently available on daily rhythms of insect vectors, particularly those responsible for the transmission of parasites to humans. Included amongst the cases described are circadian rhythms of locomotor and flight activity, and of eclosion and oviposition in tsetse flies, blood-sucking hemipterans, mosquitoes and other haematophagous insects. Both published and new data are presented, and they indicate that a study of the rhythms in disease-vector insects can provide an understanding of the value of this application of chronobiology to ecology and applied sciences. Related to this, the possibility of strategies for the control of insects based on their temporal characteristics is proposed; for example, the use of insecticides could be restricted to those phases of the day when the susceptibility of the insects to them is increased.
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Barrozo et al. (2004) studied this question.
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