SCIENTISTS in Malaysia have unleashed giant, DNA-altered mosquitoes into the environment for the hell of it.
The insects, many of which are larger than adult labradors, kill their prey by pinning it down using razor-tipped forelegs then inserting a foot-long proboscis into an eye socket and sucking out the brain matter.
Geneticist Wayne Hayes, who works at the secretive laboratory near Kualar Lumpar, said: “When you work in science, you’re always under a lot of pressure to be logical and rational and I think we were really feeling that last Tuesday.
“My colleague Stephen and I were laboriously mapping some genomes – as usual – when he looked up from his microscope and said, ‘hey, when was the last time you did something just, y’know, to be in the moment?’
“I’m a really hard science worker – most days I’m pulling 14 hour shifts. I get home with barely the energy to stick a lasagne in the microwave and at the weekends I might go to a museum.
“So I replied that I couldn’t honestly remember doing anything like that, except last June when I stayed up until 1.30am on a Tuesday watching Smokey and the Bandit II.
“Stephen gave me this look I’d never seen before and said, ‘shall we release a load of massive fucking insects?’.”
Dr Stephen Malley said: “Like I told Wayne at the time, life is just a series of moments and we’ll always remember the day when we released those giant flying carnivores via the air conditioning chute. It was very similar to something out of Point Break.”
He added: “They’ll probably just assimilate harmlessly into the ecology.
“Maybe not though.”
