Y
ou’re about to savor your first bite from a delicious candy apple when, just as your teeth are about to sink in, the fruit–candy combo slips from its stick and plummets to the ground. The clock is ticking. You quickly snatch the fallen morsel, well within five seconds—the acknowledged time limit for determining whether dropped food should end up in your mouth or in the trash.
Image: This scanning electron micrograph (SEM) shows a strain of Staphylococcus aureus bacteria. Courtesy of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Public Health Image Library, via Wikimedia Common
To read the original article: Fact or Fiction?: The 5-Second Rule for Dropped Food - Scientific American
