Bugs Hiding In Our Homes

Researchers from North Carolina State University and the Museum of Natural Science are trying to uncover the unknown bug species in our homes.

Asma Khalid: Sure, you may see the occasional centipede crawl across the living room floor, or worse, a cockroach scuttle across the kitchen. But, Michelle Trautwein says there are dozens more bug species right under our noses.

Trautwein: There's just a lot of insects and arthropods that go unnoticed in our homes. We're talking about a lot of really tiny things. You know, dust mites or other kinds of mites that you may find in your carpets or even in your wood floors in the dust samples.
So there's just a lot of unnoticed life in your house.

Trautwein is leading this bug initiative. She works at the Nature Research Center at the museum.  Researchers have discovered more than a hundred different species. And, so far, they've only inspected seven homes in the Triangle.