Why These 'Cool Images' May Send You Scurrying For Disinfectant!

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At first glance, these pictures seem a little intriguing and even appear cool to some of you. However, that opinion may change once you realize that the images are not some kind of modern art but instead, those of actual bacteria that thrive upon the touchscreens of all smart phones.

The photos are a result of a classroom experiment recently conducted by the students of England's University of Surrey for their Practical and Biomedical Bacteriology unit. They began by lifting an imprint off their smartphone screens and transferring it to bacterial growth Petri dishes.

Within three days, the students were rewarded for their efforts with many different kinds of 'cool images' - All belonging to the different bacterium that were happily thriving on their respective cell phones. The good news is that most of them were like the genus Micrococcus, a harmless bacteria that is commonly found on human skin.

A few however, did have the Staphylococcus aureus, the bacteria responsible for ailments like staph infections and food poisoning. But Dr. Simon, the professor that assigned the experiment, was not fazed by that either - That's because 20% of people are persistent carriers of this bacteria while over 60% carry it intermittently!

Another common thing found was bacteria from things the owners had recently touched. For example, one Petri dish featured a dense colony of Bacillus mycoldes - A bacteria that normally thrive in soil, which led the professor to rightfully conclude that the owner of the cellphone had recently been gardening or somehow come in contact with mud. Not surprisingly, touchscreen phones harbored more bacteria than ones with keypads - Time to revert to good old flip phones again?

Resources: Dailymail.co.uk, gizmag.com

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399 Comments
  • peacelovealmost 12 years
    im cleaning my phone right now
    • headream100
      headream100almost 12 years
      If only my phone was waterproof. I would scrub it with anti bacterial soap like a maniac. No kidding.
      • mattioalmost 12 years
        I have a iphone 5 and this makes me want to whash it
        • merpalmost 12 years
          eww mine is a slide phone thank goodness but is has a touch screen gonna go clean in now
          • oho;qabout 12 years
            Good thing i don't have a cell phone
            • bookcheese
              bookcheeseabout 12 years
              i have an iphone and i dont want mine to be like that but i gess it is like that im gunna start cleaning mine more
              • tobiasover 12 years
                yo cool dude
                • ski over 12 years
                  i have a iphone and clean it
                  • isabella over 12 years
                    im so happy that i dony have a smart phone or a touch screen!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
                    • skiover 12 years
                      coooooooooooooolll