The 'suicide bombing' of the termite species

In the insect world, it is best not to be aggressive with old termites because when they get angry, they can become suicide bombers, according to a new study.

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The study, published in the latest issue of Science magazine, seems to show that nature compensates for the weak, old and capable creatures to fight back, although they are no longer alive to tell of their glorious feat later. there.

The termites eventually have in common with the spies in the human world. In thrilling intelligence films, often when agents are arrested, they eventually 'win' with a cyanide poison pill hidden in their mouths. Once chewing the poison pill, the agent will die, erasing all the opportunities of torturing and spreading the enemy's secret. This practice happened during the Second World War.

Termites also act similarly, but even push it to a step further when eliminating not only themselves but also others around them.

Jan Šobotnik - an expert from the Czech Academy of Sciences and colleagues studied the termite species Neocapritermes taracua, which occurs mainly in Central and South America. They discovered that many worker termites had blue spots lying adjacent to the chest and abdomen.

The sizes of these blue spots vary widely and even some workers do not have them. The researchers found that these bright colored spots turned out to be an extremely toxic reservoir, including copper-containing protein crystals in pairs. These crystals will be detonated when they come into contact with the saliva of the termite.

The photo enlarges the green explosives in the "backpack" of the workers. (Photo: Discovery)

When a person who fights off an irreversible mistake is biting into one of the termites of poison, then the 'whip' - the poison that will erupt as a bomb explodes, kills 'misery', the attacker and maybe other people nearby.

The Discovery page quoted the researchers as saying: 'Since termists are responsible for a wide range of different tasks, the ability to defend themselves by suicide is expected to increase when the ability to perform tasks. Their other case drops. '

The researchers' judgment turned out to be correct. They discovered, when the termites became older and their mouths were "blunt", the weight of crystals in their 'green backpacks' increased. Although the ability of old termites to decline is reduced, these insects have equipped themselves with suicide bombing weapons in the confrontation with the enemy.