你也许认为你的家就是你的城堡，清洁用品、密封的窗、门和墙保护着你的家不被动物入侵。但是，科学家们在美国家庭进行了世界上第一次节肢动物(即昆虫、蜘蛛、螨虫和蜈蚣这些让人觉得不舒服的爬来爬去的小动物)的调查 后报告了另一个结论。他们于2012年对北卡罗来纳州罗利市的50个家庭住宅的节肢动物群落进行了随机抽样。这些房子的房龄从7年到94年不等，面积在840平方英尺到4833平方英尺之间。科学家们装备了镊子、吸气器和蝴蝶网，从每一个房间手动采集标本，有的是活的有的已经死亡。他们在家具底部和背面，沿着踢脚板、天花板，在架子上和壁橱里四处搜寻，积累了超过10,000件标本。他们从304个家庭住宅里收集了至少579种形态学物种，即那些难以准确识别的动物类型。科学家们今天在PeerJ杂志上报告说，苍蝇是最多的种类，其次是蜘蛛、甲虫、蚂蚁和书虱，而跳蚤及美洲蟑螂相对比较少见。其中的一些，如书虱，有着与人类共同生活的漫长进化史。但绝大多数标本是“无意的访客”，如瘿蚊、叶蝉，以及步甲虫(如假投弹手甲虫，如上图)，它们曾经在屋里四处徘徊，很可能是在寻找出口。

  原文链接：Your home is just crawling with bugs

  原文摘要：You may think your home is your castle, protected from animal invaders by cleaning products, sealed windows, doors, and walls. But scientists who have conducted the world’s first survey of arthropods—creepy crawlies like insects, spiders, mites, and centipedes—in U.S. homes, report otherwise. They randomly sampled the arthropod community in 50 homes in Raleigh, North Carolina, in 2012. The houses ranged in age from 7 to 94 years old, and from 840 to 4833 square feet. Armed with forceps, aspirators, and butterfly nets, the scientists hand-collected specimens—living and dead—from each room. They searched under and behind furniture, along baseboards, ceilings, on shelves, and in closets, amassing a collection of more than 10,000 specimens. They gathered at least 579 morphospecies—animal types that are difficult to precisely identify—from 304 families. Flies were the most abundant, followed by spiders, beetles, ants, and book lice, wheras fleas and the American cockroach were relatively rare, the scientists report in today’s issue of PeerJ. Some of these, such as the book lice, have a long evolutionary history of living with humans. But the vast majority of specimens were inadvertent visitors, such as gall midges, leafhoppers, and ground beetles (like the false bombardier beetle, pictured above), who had wandered in and were likely looking for the exit.