Meet New York City's bedbug expert
Louis Sorkin is an entomologist at the American Museum of Natural History.
As bedbug infestations become more common, Sorkin has become New York's go-to guy for scientific information on the blood sucking pests.
Sorkin has more than earned his bedbug cred. He raises the parasites in jars for study and sustains them on his own blood.
Update: In other parasite news...
OK. As an anthropologist, I have to ask why the hell is an anthropologist (a scholar who studies people) studying bed bugs??? The feeding them with his own blood I could sort of understand, as we are inherently weird people.
Posted by: DrDick | February 21, 2009 at 08:28 PM
Entomologist. D'oh!
Posted by: Lindsay Beyerstein | February 21, 2009 at 08:41 PM
Kind of thought so. On the other hand, I have known anthropologists who did stranger things. There was the guy I went to grad school with who did his MA thesis on orgasmic response in female chimpanzees by masturbating female chimps for six months.
Posted by: DrDick | February 21, 2009 at 09:12 PM
They give degrees for that? Damn, I was robbed.
Posted by: Auguste | February 22, 2009 at 02:16 PM
Well, in fairness, there are potential drawbacks (and he did have to write his research findings and defend his methodology, etc.). At one point he was attacked a famous female chimp (who shall remain nameless), who was in heat, when she presented to him and he did not respond. She bit the side of his head and nearly took his ear off.
Posted by: DrDick | February 22, 2009 at 05:36 PM
Um, that was more than I needed to know
Posted by: NomNomNom | February 23, 2009 at 12:12 AM
I'd just like to thank Lindsay for choosing not to illustrate this post with a relevant photo.
Posted by: Uncle Kvetch | February 23, 2009 at 01:21 PM
They've evolved resistance to DDT and DDT analogs - big surprise. All you creationists who get bedbug infestations can try the traditional remedies of scratching and prayer, maybe It'll work for you.
Posted by: cfrost | February 25, 2009 at 02:24 AM