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What happens to chitinous insect remains?

Community and Forum → Other questions. Insects topics → What happens to chitinous insect remains?

amara, 11.05.2007 7:48

What is the fate of, for example, chitinous covers of beetles in the soil?
A layman asks.
Thank you in advance.

Comments

11.05.2007 8:12, Mylabris

The answer of a layman - I think they are mineralized by some bacteria or fungi. They are hardly used as a food resource by animals that are higher up in the trophic chain.

11.05.2007 8:32, omar

uh.... Decomposing solid chitin into its components is a very difficult task. Good question. In any case, the chitinous remains of highly chitinized creatures remain intact for many years.

11.05.2007 8:42, Aleksey Adamov

uh.... Decomposing solid chitin into its components is a very difficult task. Good question. In any case, the chitinous remains of highly chitinized creatures remain intact for many years.

???
According to my observations, in less than 1 year, nothing remains of the remains (medium-sized beetles). And this happens, in my opinion, under the influence of mushrooms.

11.05.2007 8:47, amara

Walking around Losino-Ostrovsky Park and meeting crushed ground beetles (mostly Carabus nemoralis - each of which seems to weigh approximately one or even 2 grams???) Every 10 meters, I thought that for one square meter. km this can amount to tons (???) chitin every year. However, if you dig the ground, the elytra are found only in the first 10 cm (maybe I just didn't notice deeper). So something is going on with them, mechanical grinding to begin with? And then?

11.05.2007 8:54, omar

Adamov, do a clean experiment. Take a hard (with dense chitin) beetle, or even a caribou, kill it and bury it shallowly in the soil, strictly memorizing the place (just remember the place exactly!). I think 5 years you will be surprised to dig out the elytra, chest and head. lol.gif tongue.gif

11.05.2007 8:59, omar

Amara, elytra do not fall deeper, because the soil is too dense smile.gifdeeper

11.05.2007 9:03, omar

The soft parts of beetles rot quite quickly, but the really dense chitin, yes, remains for many years.

11.05.2007 9:23, Aleksey Adamov

Adamov, do a clean experiment. Take a hard (with dense chitin) beetle, or even a caribou, kill it and bury it shallowly in the soil, strictly memorizing the place (just remember the place exactly!). I think 5 years you will be surprised to dig out the elytra, chest and head. lol.gif  tongue.gif

Perhaps I will conduct such an experiment.
But purely a theory... I do not observe a predominance of remains over live beetles in excavations, although in 2-3 years many more beetles died than can be observed alive during 1.1

11.05.2007 9:31, omar

Many beetles were eaten by birds, for example, frogs, toads, and other beetles, thus mixed with digestive enzymes and turned into fine chitinous dust. Of course, in this form, processing will go faster.

11.05.2007 9:41, Дзанат

Chitin is a high-molecular nitrogen-containing polysaccharide (poly-N-acetyl-a-glucosamine), similar in structure to glycogen and cellulose. Insoluble neither in water, nor in alkalis, nor in organic solvents, chitin decomposes in strong inorganic acids and under prolonged heating with caustic potassium is partially converted to chitosan.In nature, it is decomposed only by a few species of bacteria and fungi that secrete the chitinase enzyme.
I wrote it out of the directory.
Likes: 1

11.05.2007 9:45, amara

Then I found it on the Web:
Chitin is the second most abundant polysaccharide in nature (after cellulose). At least 10 gigatons of chitin are synthesised and degraded each year in the biosphere.

Other than that, of course, the problem of recycling chitin to every insect (plus other arthropods, fungi, and some nematodes?) they decide each time as they develop (using the enzyme chitinase), but that's another story.

11.05.2007 12:40, Aleksandr Ermakov

I don't know if it's really true.. But still answering the question: depending on the conditions. Under favorable conditions, chitinous insect remains can survive for thousands of years. Any paleoentomologist will tell you that. And consumers of chitin in nature are actually not so few. Plus, of course, mechanical and chemical destruction.

11.05.2007 13:15, RippeR

In my opinion, ants are in the first place in terms of chitin consumption. Last year (this is not the only one of these cases), I observed how ants almost completely devoured cerambyx cerdo (they did not have time to finish eating only the head, a piece of 1 elytra, a tendril, a paw..) Often moszhno in sunny weather to see how ants gnaw someone's remains-the crunch, then bronzovok, then someone else.. They even drag the stuff (for example, if the elytra is lying around, then this is not garbage, but food for the ants when they get to it)

11.05.2007 13:22, omar

Oh, Ripper, you're a lucky man, you live on the Klondike, you feed ants with Cerambics. And I at least got one eek.gifin the Moscow region. I would immediately cast a gold entomological box for him, probably to order rolleyes.gif

11.05.2007 13:24, Chromocenter

So after all, collections, if they are not monitored, are also destroyed, which is why the same thing does not happen in nature. Well, if you bury a dead beetle somewhere in the Gobi desert, it can lie for a long time, but under the canopy of a rain forest it is unlikely.
I think the path here is this: first, other arthropods break the covers, extracting soft tissue particles, then fungi come to the dust, and then bacteria, probably.

11.05.2007 13:25, guest: Дзанат

Well, I will add my five kopeckssmile.gif As I study podkorov beetles, often look at dead wood, collect bark and everything that is under it. Within 7 years (if they don't fall)the elytra do not change, it is possible to bring them to the species, and not only, all the remains are preserved, this is no more than 7 years.
Likes: 1

11.05.2007 13:30, omar

In uncomplicated collections, limbs break off, the thin membranes connecting the chitinous armor are damaged, and the armor itself remains wink.gif

This post was edited by omar - 05/11/2007 13: 31

11.05.2007 21:34, Aleksey Adamov

Note that the two cases described above are relatively dry environments.
Limitations, in the requirements of these (destructive) microorganisms to the environment.

How long will the remains be buried in the soil?

You can not argue, but check.

This post was edited by Adamov - 05/11/2007 21: 35

12.05.2007 7:47, amara

It turned out that MSU deals with such issues. Here's a look:
http://crops.confex.com/crops/wc2006/techprogram/P16976.HTM

and actinomycetes were the main players in this case.

This post was edited by amara - 05/12/2007 07: 51

12.05.2007 11:53, Chromocenter

Then I found it on the Web:
Chitin is the second most abundant polysaccharide in nature (after cellulose). At least 10 gigatons of chitin are synthesised and degraded each year in the biosphere.

What about peptidoglycan? is it really less?

12.05.2007 12:28, amara

"What about peptidoglycan? is it really less than that?"

Unfortunately, I don't know myself, I need to ask these guys from Moscow State University.

14.05.2007 0:12, Shofffer

In my opinion, ants are in the first place in terms of chitin consumption.

But what about the Silpha skin-eaters and dead-eaters?

15.05.2007 14:47, RippeR

Chromocenter:
Oh, if I could only get 1 cerambix! weep.gif
So just the leftovers from 1 male and that's it frown.gif

Shofffer:
2nd and 3rd place respectively tongue.gif

20.05.2007 11:52, paleobeetle

Chitin can persist for up to several million years, if only conditions allow ex

27.05.2007 16:41, paleobeetle

Chitin is most poorly preserved in the soil, and bacteria destroy it during the soil-forming process. It is stored in an anaerobic environment for a very long time, and its preservation is good, despite its age. We worked with the remains, which are 700 thousand years old, quite suitable for identification, these are mainly beetles

30.01.2009 22:11, лулу

what about Egyptian scarabs in the pyramids

30.01.2009 22:43, RippeR

there are special conditions created by a special pyramid structure, under which everything is very well preserved.. In such conditions, bloodthirsty scarabs can live in peace, feeding on the ancient remains of pharaohs, their servants, food that was left with them and other buried people.

02.02.2009 12:00, Mike Mostovski

cm.
Gupta N.S., Briggs D.E.G., Collinson M.E., Evershed R.P., Michels R., and Pancost R.D. 2007. Molecular preservation of plant and insect cuticles from the Oligocene Enspel Formation, Germany: Evidence against derivation of aliphatic polymer from sediment. Organic Geochemistry 38 (3): 404-418.
Gupta N.S., Michels R., Briggs D.E.G., Evershed R.P., and Pancost R.D. 2006. The organic preservation of fossil arthropods: an experimental study. Proceedings of the Royal Society of London. Series B: Biological Sciences 273 (1602): 2777-2783.
Martínez-Delclòs X., Briggs D.E.G., and Peñalver E. 2004. Taphonomy of insects in carbonates and amber. Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology 203 (1-2): 19-64.
Flannery M.B., Stott A.W., Briggs D.E.G., and Evershed R.P. 2001. Chitin in the fossil record: identification and quantification of D-glucosamine. Organic Geochemistry 32 (5): 745-754.

Links to abstracts and PDFs of these and other articles are available through the library of the International Paleoentomological Society: http://fossilinsects.net/lib.htm
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