WHY DO MOSQUITOES BITE SOME PEOPLE MORE THAN OTHER ?

Blood type, metabolism, exercise, shirt colour and even drinking beer can make person so delicious to mosquitoes

You’re not alone. An estimated 20 percent of people, it turns out, are more delicious for mosquitoes, and get bit more often than normal.  while scientists don’t yet have a cure for the ailment, other than preventing bites with insect repellent.  They do have a number of ideas regarding why some of us are more prone to bites than others. Here are some of the factors that could play a role:

Blood Type

As mosquitoes bite us to harvest proteins from our blood—research shows that they find certain blood types are more tasty than others. One study found that in a controlled setting, mosquitoes landed on people with Type O blood nearly twice as often as those with Type A. People with Type B blood fell somewhere in the middle of this itchy spectrum. Additionally, based on other genes, about 85 percent of people secrete a chemical signal through their skin that indicates which blood type they have, while 15 percent do not, and mosquitoes are also more attracted to secretors than

Carbon Dioxide

Mosquitoes locate their targets is by smelling the carbon dioxide emitted in their breath—they use an organ called a maxillary palp. With the help of it can detect carbon dioxide from as far as 164 feet away. As a result, people who simply exhale more of the gas over time—generally, larger people—have been shown to attract more mosquitoes than others. This is one of the reasons why children get bit less often than adults, on the whole.

Exercise and Metabolism

In addition to carbon dioxide, mosquitoes find victims at closer range by smelling the lactic acid, uric acid, ammonia and other substances expelled via their sweat, and are also attracted to people with higher body temperatures. Because strenuous exercise increases the buildup of lactic acid and heat in your body, it likely makes you stand out to the insects. Meanwhile, genetic factors influence the amount of uric acid and other substances naturally emitted by each person, making some people more easily found by mosquitos than others.

Beer
Just a single 12-ounce bottle of beer can make you more attractive to the insects, one study found. But even though researchers had suspected this was because drinking increases the amount of ethanol excreted in sweat, or because it increases body temperature, neither of these factors were found to correlate with mosquito landings, making their affinity for drinkers something of a mystery.

Pregnancy

In different studies, pregnant women have been found to attract roughly twice as many mosquito bites as others, likely a result of the fact the unfortunate confluence of two factors: They exhale about 21% carbon dioxide and are on average about 1.26 degrees Fahrenheit warmer than others.

Clothing Colour

This one might seem absurd, but mosquitoes use vision (along with scent) to locate humans, so wearing colours that stand out (black, dark blue or red) may make you easier to find, at least according to James Day, a medical entomologist

Genetics

As a whole, underlying genetic factors are estimated to account for 85% of the variability between people in their attractiveness to mosquitoes—regardless of whether it’s expressed through blood type, metabolism, or other factors. Unfortunately, we don’t (yet) have a way of modifying these genes.

WHAT HAPPENS WHEN YOU SLEEP ?

When we sleep well, we wake up feeling refreshed and alert for our daily activities. Sleeping affects how we look, feel and perform on a daily basis, and one can have a major impact on our overall quality of life. We spend about 1/3 of our lives sleeping. But far from being wasted time, from the moment we slide into unconsciousness, a whole raft of functions takes place to make sure that we get optimal benefit from our nightly rest. To get the most out of our sleep, both quantity and quality are most important. Teens need at least 8 hours and on average 9¼ hours a night of uninterrupted sleep to leave their bodies and minds rejuvenated for the next day. Sleeping is the time the body can undergo repair and detoxification. Poor sleep patterns are linked to poor health - and those who sleep less than six hours a night have a shorter life expectancy than those who sleep for longer.  If sleep is cut short, the body doesn’t have time to complete all of the phases needed for muscle repair, memory consolidation and release of hormones regulating growth and appetite. Then we wake up less prepared to concentrate, make decisions, or engage fully in school and social activities.

Sleep is the time the body can undergo repair and detoxification. Poor sleep patterns are linked to poor health - and those who sleep less than six hours a night have a shorter life expectancy than those who sleep for longer. So sleep has a profound effect on our mental, emotional and physical wellbeing.

How Does Sleep Contribute to All of These Things?

Sleep architecture follows a pattern of alternating REM (rapid eye movement) and NREM (non-rapid eye movement) sleep throughout a typical night in a cycle that repeats itself about every 90 minutes.

What role does each state and stage of sleep play?

NREM (75% of night): As we begin to fall asleep, we enter NREM sleep, which is composed of stages 1-4

Stage 1

• Between being awake and falling asleep
• Light sleep

Stage 2

• Onset of sleep
• Becoming disengaged from surroundings
• Breathing and heart rate are regular
• Body temperature drops (so sleeping in a cool room is helpful)

Stages 3 and 4

• Deepest and most restorative sleep
• Blood pressure drops
• Breathing becomes slower
• Muscles are relaxed
• Blood supply to muscles increases
• Tissue growth and repair occurs
• Energy is restored
• Hormones are released, such as: Growth hormone, essential for growth and development, including muscle development
• REM (25% of night): First occurs about 90 minutes after falling asleep and recurs about every 90 minutes, getting longer later in the night
• Provides energy to brain and body
• Supports daytime performance
• Brain is active and dreams occur
• Eyes dart back and forth
• Body becomes immobile and relaxed, as muscles are turned off.

ARE YOU SLEEPING CORRECT ? KNOW WHICH POSITION IS CORRECT.

Sleep is a natural part of the daily biological functions and we spend some time of the 24 hours sleeping. Sleep cycles are different for different persons and while 5 to 6 hours of sleep may be enough for some people, others may need up to 8 hours of sleep to feel refreshed. How you sleep is as important as the duration. This is one area which is often neglected by people.

Why sleeping positions are important? Sleeping positions are very important as you stay in a single position for hours at a time every day, and if these habits are bad, they can contribute to spinal problems. Thus, many of the spinal problems can also be alleviated by sleeping correctly.

Some of the bad sleeping positions that may adversely affect your spine are as follows.

• On your stomach - This position is in overall a bad position as it curls up the spine, especially where the neck meets the spine and can cause spinal deformities over a long period of time. Certain adjustments to this position can lessen the effects, but it is important to try to change habits and sleep in a better position.
• The fetal position - Although this is one of the more natural positions and most babies are crouched up in this form in the mother's womb; as a sleeping position, it has its disadvantages as well. The lower spine is especially put under a lot of stress when someone curls up in this position.
• On your side - Although this is safer compared to the other two, sleeping on your sides straight would cause blood circulation issues and also put a lot of stress on the relevant organs, depending on the side you were sleeping on.

In all of the cases, slight adjustments to these positions will lessen the stress on the spine and also help you sleep better.

Some of the adjustments that you can make are:

1. Sleep with a pillow between your knees to align your hips and cause less strain on the spine.

2. If you don't have sleep apnea, put a pillow under your knees to raise them while lying on you back.

3. If you sleep on your back, try to consciously change your position to sleep on the side.

4. Try and actively change your posture throughout the day to ensure good sleeping position at night.