Letters
…getting pleasure from reading
the obituaries…
e-letters: Cockroaches as heavy breathers
Re the February UCHICAGO.EDU
e-bulletin’s link to the item on insect breath research
(see “Citations,”):
As a biopsychology student at the U of C I worked with
cockroaches and had the enviable job of raising these
creatures for research. One of these ancient, perfectly
evolved insects was the Brazilian variant—very large
and relatively inactive for reasons of energy conservation.
However, when it was picked up or otherwise threatened,
it not only became active it also pumped air noisily through
its spiracles to oxygenate itself. This behavior was well
known by the biopsychology students familiar with work
being done with the various cockroaches in the old labs.
Many samples probably live on campus to this day! It is
interesting that a lifetime later, science is catching
up with what was common knowledge in our little sector
of the campus. No doubt the present research is somewhat
more sophisticated than our approach—the grab and
listen version of pre-digital science—but nonetheless,
I think we had at least one species pegged as a mouth
breather...err..spiracle breather!
Neil Fiertel, SB’64
Spruce Grove, Alberta
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