Photo courtesy USDA/ARS

There's no doubt about it -- mosquitoes are a total pain. They land on you, bite you, suck out some blood and leave behind an itchy welt. In the United States, however, the rise of West Nile Virus has moved mosquitoes from the "simply annoying" list onto the "danger" list, and they are now something to be feared. Disease danger has always been the case in tropical regions, where the main mosquito-borne parasite is malaria.

There are different ways to control mosquitoes. You can stay indoors (but what fun is that?). You can use DEET, but it is a smelly bother to keep applying it. You can try using things like citronella candles or torches to confuse the mosquito's sensors. What if, instead, you wanted to get rid of mosquitoes for good?

The way to eliminate mosquitoes permanently would be to kill all the mosquitoes in an area. That way, there are no more mosquito eggs being laid and thus no new mosquitoes. To kill all of the mosquitoes, you would need to devise the world's best mosquito trap. In this article, we will discuss the elements of the ideal mosquito trap and learn how a commercially available mosquito trap like the Mosquito MagnetŪ works.