What were some of the interesting facts about microscopic creatures that you hadn't known before? What was the most interesting fact you found from the video? What is that itch? What is lurking under the sheets in your bed and burrowing into your scalp? They are everywhere -- in your house, on your body. They use you for sustenance. Creepy? You bet. Learn more about these "creepy crawlers" in the Nova program Odyssey of Life: The Unknown World. Microphotographer Lennart Nilsson, famous for his extraordinary work in the Miracle of Life program, takes a close-up, never-before-seen look at the microscopic creatures that are very much a part of your everyday life. ~ Laura Mahnken, Rovi What did you think about this video?
36 Comments
Katelyn Connor
11/29/2010 01:43:29 am
This video was very interesting, but on the other hand it kind of creeped me out. The film made me look at our world in a new way; infested with many bugs and other creatures. I never realized that there were so many bugs around us. In the movie, it described the createures are how they could be lurking asnywhere including in your bed, skin or fur coats. Thsi was very disturbing and I bet not a lot of people are aware of this.
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Dave Tice
11/29/2010 01:43:45 am
This movie was really creepy. It said that ignorance is bliss and i agree with that. I didnt really want to know about all the microscopic things that live in my hair and on my body. The other weird thing was the excelerated decomp. of the bird. But all in all the movie was interesting and i learned alot about how microscopic organisms function and operate
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Lauren Giarrusso
11/29/2010 03:56:13 am
Before watching the movie, I wasn't aware that bugs were infested in things we use and wear every day. I found it interesting that small bugs crawl through clothing because they're so small and almost invisible to the human eye. I'd never known that bugs can hide in your bed, especially with that many legs. I thought the video was informative because I learned a lot about where bugs live within your home and in nature.
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Amanda Manickas
11/29/2010 04:01:40 am
Well this video really creeped me out and discusted me. I could not even look at the screen for long periods of time because it was getting me sick. I did find the movie interesting only because I never realized all of the microscopic creatures that are around and where they are on our bodies. This movie made me really nervous to go to sleep and discusted about myself because i know that I have a ton of creatures on me and it grosses me out.
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Stephanie Donoyan
11/29/2010 04:25:25 am
While watching this video, Odyssey of Life: The Unknown World, I learned a lot of new facts about microscopic creatures that I had not known before. The most interesting fact that I had found from this video was insects live inside and outside of our bodies. Also, I did not know that we shed a tremendous amount of skin flakes (dead skin) every hour. The itch could be referring to our skin cells coming off or insects crawling on/in our skin. Bed bites are the insects lurking under the sheets in our beds, and a "hair-follicle mite" is its full name for what is buried in our scalps. This was a creepy movie overall, and at points it was hard to believe that this information was actually true. For instance, I did not know that the insects in our scalps actually looked like that and crawled like that when they were zoomed in on the video. Consequently, I thought the video was disturbing, but it was an informational way to get out the information that many of us are not informed about today.
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Vineela Goli
11/29/2010 04:44:08 am
Before watching the movie the only creatures i knew that live in a human body are head lice but after watching the movie i realized that there are many millions of creatures living in and on our body. I also did not know that we shed over millions of dead skin every hour.I did not understand the topic of dust mites. The narrator says the dust mites clean a human so i was confused whether to believe if dust mites are good or bad. I thought the video was scary and disturbing but i knew it was all that is happening around us everyday.
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justin sundaram
11/29/2010 05:39:17 am
i never knew how many microscopic creatures lived in and around our bodies. it was interesting to see all the different organisms and how they interact with each other. for example, i never knew that we live symbiotically with dust mites. i didnt know that they
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Kristen McKay
11/29/2010 06:07:36 am
This video was very interesting and creepy at the same time. I knew that there were microscopic creatures but I had no idea that they were living on us. I found it disgusting that they are in our hair and even on our forearms. The most interesting fact from the video for me was that we shed skin all the time and that it is what makes up most of the dust. I thought that it was disgusting that bugs ate it as well. I also did not know that there are bugs that live in cotton and wool. I have a wool coat and I won't be able to look at it the same way. This also means that all of the clothes that we wear have bugs climbing throughout them. This is a revolting thought. The "itch" could be the bugs that crawl throughout our clothing and all over our skin. The bugs that are in our beds are disgusting and so are the "hair-follicle mites" which burrow into our scalps. Overall, this movie was disgusting and it was eye opening to find out what we all have throughout our bodies.
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Edward Cummins
11/29/2010 06:42:56 am
This movie was extremely creepy. I was aware that their are living parasites all over us and other objects but I wasn't aware that there were so much and they were capable of that much damage. I found it very disturbing how they showed the microscopic version of the parasites and showed the different parasites on different every day objects. It was disturbing to see the insects crawling all over the hairs of our arms and the palms of our hands as if it was a barren wasteland. Along with the creepy aspects of the movie, it was also very interesting to realize that there are that many insects on our body. I learned that they are very helpful for they clean up as well as destroy. Although disgusting, the insects use all the resources they can. This was shown when the dove died and they used all the feathers for their own needs so in a way they were using what's left of the body which is recycling. It also amazed me how short of a time it took to do this. It said 14 days. So, in the end, this was a very disturbing but educational movie that taught us that there is more than the eye can see.
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zack
11/29/2010 06:57:43 am
I learned a lot about what is really all around us. Not only the internal bacteria that our cells fight off every second, but how our body’s exterior provides the nutrients for so many gross insects. The video was pretty gross and definitely not helpful before lunch period, but there was certainly a lot to learn. The bug that stood out as the most disgusting was the gross fur coat beetles that burrow through even the most expensive fur coats.
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Julia Gannon
11/29/2010 07:05:03 am
sorry for the blank one, didn't mean to do that, my computer has a mind of its own!
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Eric Brown
11/29/2010 07:26:49 am
I found this video creepy because I never knew how many microscopic creatures that we have living on and in us. It was also interesting and disgusting because there are tiny creatures that are living all over and inside of our body. For example, they are in our hair, on our forearms, on our legs, and burrowing into our skin. In my opinion, the most interesting fact was that dust mites eat the dead skin and hair-follicles that fall off of our body. I find it disgusting that there are tiny little bugs that I cannot see living in my clothes, and it makes me understand why certain clothes may be more itchy than others, it may not be the fabric itself, but the bugs that crawl through the fabric. i find it to be repulsive that there are bugs that live in my bed and burrow into my scalp while I'm sleeping, and it makes me happy to know that whatever burrows into my skin will die soon enough from the chlorine in the pool during swim practice. In the end, I found this movie interesting, but some of the information that was given to us in the movie was a bit of a turn off.
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Rebecca Hirschmann
11/29/2010 07:28:11 am
The video was very interesting, but also gross and scary. I learned a lot from this video because i did not know all the different kinds of microcopic bugs that live off of our skin. It's really weird that they eat the bacteria and dead skin off of our bodies. I never knew that. I never knew that bugs could live on our sheets and clothing. That was interesting to find out, however it is creepy and somewhat disturbing. The most interesting fact i learned is that we shed skin all throughout the day, and it is food for dust mites. I'm scared to think that the itches we have on our bodies are just the bugs crawling all over us. Even though this movie was disturbing it was also very interesting to find out what can live on us and our clothing.
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Alex lollohan
11/29/2010 07:33:55 am
urrr the video actually made me sick. but if the video was less... alarmist sounding then it probably would have been better. i'm now vividly aware of why i really want to take a shower and feel itchy. ignorance really is bliss. i personally think that this video would have been so much better if it was just a bunch of dudes in costumes, but the new photoraphy was pretty cool.
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Lara Kuscu
11/29/2010 07:56:17 am
This video was, well, not the most appetizing but very interesting. I never knew that these little creatures crawl within our hair, skin, and even clothing. Aside from the fact that this movie was slightly disturbing, I found it to be very interesting that humans shed over one million skin cells each hour. I believe that I was most grossed out by the fact that insects and microscopic bugs are all around us and we can't see them.
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11/29/2010 08:18:43 am
I found this video extremely interesting, but on the other hand disgusting. It’s just plain weird to know that there are all of these organisms out there that we don’t know about. It was interesting to learn that our bodies and all living things are made up of millions of tiny organisms. I wonder how different the world would seem if we were able to see these organisms from the human eye. Some cool facts that I learned were that the human’s skin sheds about one millions skin cells every hour. I also learned that a hair follicle is actually a tiny creature. That fact freaked me out the most! Another thing that was freaky was when we learned that there are tiny bugs on all of our clothing and books and such. It seems like everything you can see and touch has tiny organisms on it, and you won’t be able to see them. I knew that dust was made up of dead skin cells so I guess it’s only logical that little organisms are in dust. Though these creatures are extremely creepy, I find it very interesting that they actually play a very important role in our lives. These bugs actually dispose of the bacteria and dead skin cells on our body. Who would have thought that little machines were at work on our skin our whole lives? It’s truly fascinating. It makes me want to learn more about the human body and what’s living inside and on it.
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11/29/2010 08:40:04 am
Alex Lollohan oh my god so funny. Anyway, I found the video to be amazingly educational in every way. The pure knowledge that I gained about bacteria and the like from this video is enough to melt a small planet. So in order to save us all from myself destroying half the earth with my now infinite knowledge about biology I will write no further.
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Peter Son Chau <3
11/29/2010 08:43:06 am
The video was very interesting and kept my attention throughout the whole class period. To be completely honest, one does not think about microscopic creatures that can be crawling everywhere we are such as on the bed, table or even on the clothes we wear. Sure I see occassional insects or creatures that would be crawling around my room especially SILVERFISH, which is one my long life rivals that i have to deal with, but I never knew or notice that creatures could be that SMALL besides like lice and etc. In the video, it looked as if these creatures would be very noticable but in reality they aren't and the creatures or maggots i believe that feed off of your clothes leave a damaging effect to fashion wear. I found it interesting in that it was a disturbing reality that i came to face and i almost found myself wanting to sanitize everything in my room but....i'm too lazy too. Overall, the video was interesting, disgusting, and disturbing but these microscopic creatures are something knew i learned from it. Very lovely experience.
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Vanessa Ribeiro
11/29/2010 08:45:51 am
This amazingly disgusting, yet informative video rendered me speechless in my long profound journey in learning more about the human body. I was amazed and appalled by all of the creatures shown throughout the film. I was actually quite intrigued by the fact that dust mites are always eating dead skin. Don't get me wrong, it was completely nasty, but at the same time it was really weird knowing that things our body doesn't need anymore gets shed off, thus forming a feast for tiny insects called dust mites. I would also like to address the microscopic moles in our scalp that the video brought up. It really makes me wonder about why sometimes a part of our body gets itchy. It's actually nauseating just thinking about how such gross beings grow and develop while we are unaware of what is going on.
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Nick DeMeo
11/29/2010 08:55:37 am
The movie made me think of the smaller organisms in the world. I never knew that all those bug thrived on our waste. It really grosses you out when you find out that thousands of little organisms live in your intestines, hair, and just about every part of your body, yet they help manage your digestion and waste. Yet, probably the most interesting part of the video was when they actually pointed out how big some of the bugs where. Some of them were close to half an inch long, but I never even see them. Makes you really think about the scope of life and how we can gain knowledge from it.
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Sarah Kelley
11/29/2010 09:00:12 am
The Unknown World film really shocked me, I honestly had never been aware of the fact that actual living organisms live on us! It was really gross to think that on our skin and in our hair there are tiny minute bugs living off of us. As Vanessa pointed out above me, the dust mites evolving on our bodies was intriguing. While I was watching the movie I was getting itchy thinking about the dust mites that could be crawling on me. This video truly did allow me to gain a whole new perspective, I never will see my skin or a fur coat the same way again, that's for sure. I never realized that we humans are continuously shedding skin cells...which ultimately these "bugs" feed off.
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Nick Engle
11/29/2010 09:05:43 am
Although I did not get to see the majority of the movie I did get to see what types of things were living on my body and around me. I don't think I'll ever looking at itching the same way again after seeing what causes it in the skalp. I guess it goes to show you that just because you can't see something doesn't mean that there's nothing there. As my pal Peter said above, one really doesn't think about the different types of things that live on your body. It was creepy yet interesting at the same time. I only wish I could've seen more of it.
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Kathryn Machinski
11/29/2010 09:06:44 am
I was oddly fascinated by the movie. I already knew that all sorts of organisms live in, on and around our bodies but I didn't know to what extent. Like, how many inhabit our bodies or even if they stay there all of the time. These organisms actually remind me of a shark that has organisms or parasites (I think) living on the shark's eyes. But, the sharks are born blind and they don't need their eyes. So the organism uses what the sharks don't use to live which is similar to the organism that feeds off of our dead skin. We don't need that dead skin but the organism needs it to live.
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David Michael Drocic
11/29/2010 09:06:53 am
So this film was just plain old creepy. The things that they showed made me get goosebumps, half of the stuff I didn't even know it was related to like real life things. I thought practically everything on us was dead, besides like skin, but I never would have suspected stuff like the itch, that was just really weird. This video really emphasized what goes on in everyday life, stuff that nobody would even expect to be happening. I think that it was actually very educational and should definitely be shown to other classes, even though it is quite disturbing.
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Emma Hart ♥
11/29/2010 09:57:19 am
Overall, I think this movie opened my eyes to a lot of things. For one thing, it made me want to take a shower every second of the day because it was extremely gross to see how many bugs were just sitting on your skin and in your hair. The next thing was that it made me rethink the way bugs and organisms live. They aren’t all bad. They do help us clean ourselves and they live off of the things that we don’t think much about. I have also come to the conclusion that I will never, ever buy a wool shirt or a fur coat. The bugs and beetles living on and in those clothing items makes me want tell people not to sell them. It’s ridiculous to think that no one can get away from them. The people who make clothing make the clothing with the organisms already living in it. This movie definitely taught me to think about the things I’m wearing and where I live because they may contain creatures that could help or hurt me.
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Matthew Hoey
11/29/2010 10:12:19 am
Personally, I would have rather never known that so many bugs infest the common areas of my clothes and house. I kind of find it disgusting that so many microscopic insects are squirming around similar objects, and reproducing in them as well. The most interesting, but worst part about this information is that there are thousands of these insects that infest these objects. There are so many that we are unaware of that it's quite disgusting when you really think about it. Especially the bugs on your skin. When you itch, it's really some type of microscopic insect knawing at the skin on your body. Quite repulsive indeed...
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Tom Wynne
11/29/2010 10:17:17 am
In the movie, I learned about different organisms not visible to the naked eye. I also learned that diseases such as aids attack your immune system. I found it interesting that I now know what kissing looks like from the perspective of the tounge.
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Paige Snyder
11/29/2010 10:40:10 am
This movie really creeped me out. Everywhere I look now I'm wondering if little organisms are crawling on it. When i scratch me arm or head it makes me wonder if it is itchy because of those organisms. I was not surprised that insects cover every inch of plant life. But I was surprised that so many tiny insects impact our everyday life. They transfer diseases and ruin our clothes. That really shocked me.
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Jenna Deautel
11/29/2010 11:14:20 am
This movie was extremely interesting but it creeped me out. I always knew that tiny, microscopic bugs always lived on my skin but i never knew what they appeared to look like and i never knew what they actually did. After watching this video, i got a visual picture of what these creatures looked like and it really creeped me out. One interesting fact that made me a little creeped out was about how many bacteria organisms mutliple in hours, about a million in 8 hours. That is a huge number for such a short period of time. I think it was good to learn about all the organisms that live on us, in us, and around us because we take life for granted and these little creatures help us in many ways. They help the flow of blood stop when we get a cut, it helps clean our body, and they keep the circle of life going. Although this movie was extremely creepy and made me think about bugs on me and in the bed i am in laying in right now, it was also very interesting to learn about these creatures.
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Justin Kelly
11/29/2010 11:21:50 am
I have to say that the movie was creepy but very interesting because it went into organisms that luck beyond the naked eye. This video really got you to think about the world around you and how many things you never see happening on a day to day basis. Plus some of these insects I can't believe I’ve ever seen them before like the little scorpion on the text book. The footage of the insects and the viruses was also very cool, and I really enjoyed this video.
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Alex Carlson
11/29/2010 08:20:50 pm
Well, i never knew that creatures like these lived right under our noses. it's fascinating yet also weird that i can't even move without a small organism being effect by the movment on my skin.overall the movie was gave me an insight onto microscopic organisms but i still think it's creepy.
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Brandon Foster
11/29/2010 09:40:48 pm
I want to say that the movie was very odd and very creepy because just to think tht all of those bugs and organisms are all over your body, clothes, beds, EVERYWHERE!! is just a bit gross. I feel the most interestingt hing i learned from this video is that people think that all these organsisms are gross and disgusting, as do i bu, but then when you really think about it they are really keeping us clean and healthy.
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Bryan Sadowski
11/29/2010 09:49:35 pm
This movie was extremely creepy. It just made me want to itch because it just made you think about all of those creepy microscopic organisms that you can’t see with the naked eye. It just makes you think about something you don’t really need to necessarily know about. This movie kind of reminded me the feeling that you would get when you learn what it inside a hot dog. They say that ignorance is bliss and i agree with them.
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BArrett JOurdan
11/29/2010 09:51:10 pm
"how do I look dear?" the wife said. "you look beautiful" the husband said in a soft voice. then they leaned in for a romantic kiss.... IT WAS GROSS. The camera was placed in there mouth and it looked really disgusting. The rest of the Movie followed this same formate, disgusting.... bugs everywhere all over us and all over everything in every aspect of our lives. like when i got home, i felt ichy everywhere, and it was not alergies! i literaly felt like there were microscopic organisms walking all over me. At night i dreamed of monster bugs. THis film scared me emotional and fisacly from the scratching. But i still thought that it was cool how there is a whole world that i can not even see.
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Kyle Jackson
12/3/2010 06:50:56 am
Well, I can finnaly post a blog on this about this video. It has only taken me basically a week to get this up. But I can say that this video made me a little alarmed, but not grossed out. I mean, it is a little creepy finding out that all those unappealing looking creatures live so closely with us and live basically off of our well being. But yet when you think about it, it is really good to have these little creatures on our bodies. Like that tiny little creature that lives in your hair, better to have that living there than to have an even gigger nastier threatening creature scratching at your head!
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Sam Raheb
1/4/2011 09:44:57 pm
After watching this video, I feel more aware of the things that are living around us. I knew that there were small creatures living in our beds but I did not know that they were everywhere in my home. I also learned that a lot of property is damaged from these small creatures finding food. Take an insect display at a museum for example. It takes years for the collection to grow and in a matter of hours it can be destroyed be small insects feeding off on the dead bugs.
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