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Science 24 January 2003:
Vol. 299. no. 5606, pp. 558 - 560
DOI: 10.1126/science.1078008
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Reports

Tracheal Respiration in Insects Visualized with Synchrotron X-ray Imaging

Mark W. Westneat,*1 Oliver Betz,12 Richard W. Blob,13 Kamel Fezzaa,4 W. James Cooper,15 Wah-Keat Lee4

Insects are known to exchange respiratory gases in their system of tracheal tubes by using either diffusion or changes in internal pressure that are produced through body motion or hemolymph circulation. However, the inability to see inside living insects has limited our understanding of their respiration mechanisms. We used a synchrotron beam to obtain x-ray videos of living, breathing insects. Beetles, crickets, and ants exhibited rapid cycles of tracheal compression and expansion in the head and thorax. Body movements and hemolymph circulation cannot account for these cycles; therefore, our observations demonstrate a previously unknown mechanism of respiration in insects analogous to the inflation and deflation of vertebrate lungs.

1 Department of Zoology, Field Museum of Natural History, Chicago, IL 60605, USA.
2 Department of Zoology, University of Kiel, Germany.
3 Department of Biological Sciences, Clemson University, Clemson, SC 29634, USA.
4 Experimental Facilities Division, Advanced Photon Source, Argonne National Laboratory, Argonne, IL 60439, USA.
5 Department of Organismal Biology and Anatomy, University of Chicago, Chicago, IL 60637, USA.
*   To whom correspondence should be addressed. E-mail: mwestneat{at}fieldmuseum.org

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