Everyone has a 'microbial cloud'

BBC ^ | James Gallagher

[BenLurkin]

Everyone is surrounded by a unique "cloud" of millions of their own bacteria, according to scientists at the University of Oregon in the US.

Walk through someone else's cloud, and it will "rain" bacteria on your skin and be breathed into your lungs.

The study on 11 people, published in the journal PeerJ, showed it was possible to identify people from their microbial miasma.

...

Groups of bacteria in the cloud included Streptococcus, which is common in the mouth, and the skin bugs Propionibacterium and Corynebacterium.

The researchers argue the mix may have a "forensic application" to detect whether someone had passed through a room.

However, it is not clear how much someone's microbial cloud changes over time.

Adam Altrichter, a research assistant on the project, told the BBC News website: "There is a germaphobe aspect to this, but we need to understand that we're not sterile and this is something completely natural and healthy."

He said the size of someone's cloud was still untested, but was likely to be a few feet.

[biff]

I always claimed the folks on the CSI could solve a murder years after the fact with their new machine, ‘Track a Poot”, which tests the dna of the “cloud”.