8 Reasons Why Mosquitoes May Love You More Than Other People
Have you ever been outside in the summertime with a group of people and you were just getting tore up by mosquitoes and literally no one else was getting bit?
This seems to happen to me all the time. Am I just "juicier" to mosquitoes' taste buds? Is my blood more delicious to them?
I've always thought there has to be something to my theory. There must be some scientific evidence to prove that I have something in me that mosquitoes love more than in other people.
Well, it appears that there is a whole bunch of science to this.
For starters, the female mosquito uses blood to feed her young. She can fly approximately 1.5 miles per hour, searching for carbon dioxide. And she's armed with nerve cells with specialized receptors that can detect carbon dioxide from our exhalations as far as 160 feet away.
Once she hones in on your carbon dioxide plume and gets within eight inches of your body, she will sense your body's heat and moisture, along with other chemicals that include ammonia, butanol, and lactic acid. A mosquito can detect more than 100 human odors.
Now, given this background, what makes some of us more attractive than others?
Research has shown that mosquitoes tend to be attracted to people for the following eight reasons.
8 Reasons Why Mosquitoes Love You More Than Other People
This explains a lot for me. I drink, have a consistently higher body temperature and I like wearing dark clothing.
Good thing I'm not pregnant!