Talk:Autothysis

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[edit] Citations desired

Some citations would be nice - it sounds a little hoax-like. Why do the termites blow themselves up in the first place? Andjam 04:05, 26 January 2006 (UTC)

A defence mechanism? It gets very few non-Wikipedia Google hits, but some Google Group hits seem to confirm it. This is one of those things where we need some off-net sources. violet/riga (t) 09:34, 26 January 2006 (UTC)

A New interpretation of the Defense Glands of Neotropical Ruptitermes (Isoptera, Termitidae, Apicotermitinae) By A. M. Costa-Leonardo ... from the abstract: The termites of the genus Ruptitermes are known for the suicidal behavior of the workers which liberate a sticky defensive secretion by body bursting ... KEY WORDS: defensive behavior, autothysis, termites, salivary glands, dehiscent glands found at http://www.csuchico.edu/biol/Sociobiology/volume/sociobiologyv44n22004.html --Graatz 19:42, 14 April 2006 (UTC)

Definitely not a hoax. There was an article ~20 years ago in Scientific American about the astounding chemical warfare tactics of many genera of termites; it was written by a scientist looking into the chemical aspects (and getting taught a few things by the termites). Exploding is just the half of it. There were the "slash-and-daub" soldiers, who with one arm would rent the enemy's body, then use the other arm to quickly fill the wound with a corrosive substance. In some species, the self-explosion is caused by mixing two chemicals, maintained separately in the body until moments of extremis, mixing which causes an explosion -- much like the old Soda-Acid fire extinguisher which worked on this principle, when sulphuric acid came into contact with soda water. The explosion coats the enemies with sticky or downright damaging materials from the soldier's innards. In other cases the soldier would expel the corrosive substance towards the enemy exactly like a fire extinguisher. --MikeQ 18:18, 17 August 2006 (UTC)