Hi everybody this is Monica Reinagel the nutrition diva here with this week's quick and dirty tip for eating well and feeling fabulous

a couple of weeks ago I ran an episode on foods that can help protect your skin from sun damage,

and a bunch of you emailed to ask if I could also do an episode on foods that keep mosquitoes

away.

Now I realize that this advice isn't exactly timely for my

friends down in Sydney Australia who are in the midst of the coldest winter ever,

but trust me mates, summer and mosquitoes will come again and when they do you'll be ready.

Mosquitoes find their victims by smell.

Specifically, their sensory organs are trained to zero in on sources of carbon dioxide and lactic acid because these chemicals reliably lead them to warm-blooded

animals like you and me. Chemical repellants like off keep mosquitoes away but it's not because

mosquitoes don't like the smell of these repellents.

Rather, it's because the chemical deat is very effective at masking the smell of carbon dioxide

and lactic acid.

When you're wearing deat, the mosquitoes can't smell you, and so they leave you alone.

Natural repellents like geranium oil or citronella work the same way.

They just don't seem to be quite as effective as Diet.

Now you've probably noticed that mosquitoes seem to be more attracted to some people than others.

That's also because of smell and not because mosquitoes prefer certain blood types as people sometimes say.

Each of us has a distinctive smell, a sort of aromatic

fingerprint. There are about 400 or so different aromatic compounds that make up the

human scent and about 30 of them appear to have a masking effect.

If any of these compounds happen to be prominent in your

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