Number of bacteria on skin

Value 1e+12 unitless
Organism Human Homo sapiens
Reference Berg RD. The indigenous gastrointestinal microflora. Trends Microbiol. 1996 Nov4(11):430-5. p.431 right column bottom paragraphPubMed ID8950812
Comments Dividing this value by the number of skin cells (10^11 BNID 101734) gives a ratio of ~10 'skin' bacteria to one skin cell. The skin is a less hospitable place for bacterial growth compared with the GI tract (which has 10^14 bacteria, same paragraph in ref) because of the lack of water. See BNID 108505
Entered by Uri M
ID 105712