The mosquitoes that carry the dengue and chikungunya viruses are more widespread than ever before, and are likely to increase their ranges.

Simon Hay at the University of Oxford, UK, and his team compiled more than 40,000 records of the occurrence of the mosquitoes Aedes aegypti and Aedes albopictus. They combined this with environmental data to map the current and possible range of these insects at a 5 × 5-kilometre scale.

These two Aedes species are found widely in all continents except Antarctica, but are still not reported in habitat that is potentially suitable for them. The team's maps could direct surveillance of these mosquitoes in understudied areas.

eLife http://doi.org/5tz (2015)