Guess what? You see that thing up there? It's on your face right now. Actually, there's probably like millions of them on you. Now, before you scream and run to the sink to rub your face off, you should understand that these are face mites, and they are not harmful. "Gross," you might say, and you'd probably be right. Those things look nasty. 

The latest research has concluded that, "100 percent of people over 18 years of age appear to host at least one Demodex species, suggesting that Demodex mites may be universal associates of adult humans," according to a paper published in the journal PLoS ONE this month. 

It makes sense. Relative to the microscopic world, human beings are beyond gigantic. We are known to host symbiotic life of more than one variety. A symbiont is a life form that has a mutually beneficial relationship with another life form, and they are then said to live in symbiosis with each other. The Demodex mites are just one such microscopic life form that can be found on or in our bodies. 

According to scientists, there is approximately three to six mites per hair follicle on your body. And there are apparently 5 million hair follicles on the the average human. I'll let you do the math and then start to scream. 

But this revelation is only news in the sense that scientists are just now concluding that essentially every human adult has these things on them. Yet, these mites were reportedly first discovered as far back as 1842, and are "completely harmless," according to Wired. Let's hope they're right. The extent of what these mites actually do and how we came to host them, is still a bit of a mystery. 

If this sort of thing intrigues you (and if it does, gross) you're in luck. There's a gallery of all sorts of people's face mites. So please, enjoy them at your leisure. Weirdo. And bask in the wonder that is the microscopic world as you reaffirm the old addage that ignorance was bliss.