Bacteria is like death, global warming or the Pizza Hut Crown Crust pizza — we know it’s all around us, affecting our lives in ways we’re not even aware of, but it’s easier on our psyches to just pretend it doesn’t exist. But, despite our best efforts, sometimes something comes along that forces us to confront the fact that we live in a world that’s positively blanketed in gross-looking organisms.

This experiment, done by students studying bacteriology at the University of Surrey, is one of those things.

Behold the invisible life that’s growing on your cell phone right now:

This photo is the result of three days of growth, after a student imprinted their phone in a Petri dish to culture the bacteria that was growing on it. The bacterium in this photo is called Bacillus mycoides, and although it looks nasty, it’s actually harmless. However, some phones in the experiment were found to be of the disease-carrying Staphylococcus aureus variety, which causes – you guessed it – staph infections. Great.

For the most part, however, the bacterium that grows on phones (and just about every other surface) isn’t harmful, even if it is unpleasant to think about. So don’t worry about it! If it makes you feel any better, taking a culture from your hands would likely yield much grosser results. Er … sorry. Try to put it out of your mind — and maybe go wipe down your phone, just to be safe.