TU Study Shows Bats, Cavemen To Thank For Bedbugs

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TULSA, Oklahoma -

Bedbugs can cost thousands of dollars if they infest our homes, and now it's looking like we have bats and cavemen to thank.

One TU professor's study goes back a quarter-million years and uses bedbugs that came over from Europe.

The best kind of bed bug is a dead one, most would say, and that's exactly how they came in to TU Biology Professor, Dr. Warren Booth's lab.

We send out packages on a weekly basis to pest control companies, hoping that they'll return vials of bed bugs, Booth said.

His most recent study was published in the journal Molecular Ecology. It zeroed in on where bedbugs came from and why they reappeared in the 1980s.

Based off DNA studies, he said there are two distinct groups of the blood-sucking pests.

So this paper essentially shows there's a bat-associated lineage and a human-associated lineage in Europe, Booth said.

He said bats were the first host for bedbugs in ancient times, and said bedbugs were introduced to humans a quarter of a million years ago when people shared caves with bats.

That's when Booth said some of the parasites feeding on bats evolved and started feeding on humans instead, and now the two groups no longer interact.

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TU Study Shows Bats, Cavemen To Thank For Bedbugs

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