As a person whom mosquitoes seem to find absolutely delicious, I’ve always wondered what it is about me that they prefer over everyone else I’m hanging out with outdoors. Is my blood tastier? Am I somehow more nutritious? Have mosquitoes collectively decided that I’m the one and only all-you-can-eat buffet of the human race?
According to reporting from Agence France-Presse, conducted interviews with mosquito researchers and published by Science Alert, it’s probably because I have an invisible cloud of chemicals leaking off my body that mosquitoes find irresistible.
Mosquitoes love carbon dioxide. Every time you exhale, you’re essentially turning yourself into that delicious barbecue place in town that you can smell from several blocks away. Female mosquitoes, in particular, can spot and smell carbon dioxide from several meters away. As they get closer to the source of that carbon dioxide, they start to sense a person’s body odor, body temperature, and surrounding humidity.
Scientists Have a New Explanation for Why Mosquitoes Won’t Leave You Alone
All of that combines to produce a chemical signature that mosquitoes either find irresistible or ignore. The interesting part is that we don’t always produce the same chemical signature. That’s why there are some days when we’re a walking mosquito buffet, and days when some other unfortunate soul has become that day’s blood smorgasbord.
Maybe the biggest determining factor is body odor. We emit all sorts of scent compounds through our skin thanks to the trillions of microbes living on us at all times. A recent study found that mosquitoes can identify up to 27 different odor compounds, and one of them, 1-octen-3-ol, was present at higher concentrations in people mosquitoes love to bite.
Meaning, I’m probably filled to the brim with 1-octen-3-ol.
So, no, it has nothing to do with blood types or skin color, or any other purported factor that we can now safely classify as an urban myth. But according to the AFP report, there is one group of people who, regardless of whether they had 1-octen-3-ol coursing through them, were feasts for mosquitoes: beer drinkers.
Researchers found that drinking beer raises your body temperature, increases your carbon dioxide output, and changes your body odor, all in ways that drive mosquitoes wild. A Dutch study found that people who had a beer within the past 24 hours had a significantly higher chance of attracting mosquitoes than those who hadn’t.
So, it turns out, mosquitoes are eating me for one of the same reasons I eat the food that I like to eat: I smell really, really good. From now on, I’ll take each bite as a compliment.
The post Scientists Finally Know Why Mosquitoes Always Bite Certain People appeared first on VICE.
