News Animals

Static electricity can pull ticks on to their hosts

It's possible other external parasites might respond to electrostatic forces the same way

A close up photo of a castor bean tick sitting on dry grass.

Ticks, like this castor bean tick (Ixodes ricinus), might sometimes make the jump to hosts thanks to static electricity.

W.alter/Wikimedia (CC BY-SA 4.0)

By Soumya Sagar

You don’t need to touch a tick for it find you, a new study suggests. The blood-sucking parasites may be able to catapult themselves from vegetation to their hosts thanks to static electricity.

Mammals, birds and reptiles carry considerable electrostatic charges — equivalent to voltages of hundreds to tens of thousands of volts.