Mar 30 2024Frontiers But hemolymph, the equivalent of blood in insects, has a very different composition, being notably lacking in red blood cells, hemoglobin, and platelets, and having amoeba-like cells called hemocytes instead of white blood cells for immune defense.
“Next, hemocytes aggregate, starting from the wound surface and moving up to embrace the coating hemolymph film that eventually becomes a crust sealing the wound.” They restrained individual hornworms in a plastic sleeve, and made a slight wound in one of each caterpillar’s pseudolegs through a window in the sleeve. They then touched the dripping hemolymph with a metal ball, which was pulled away, creating a hemolymph ‘bridge’ that subsequently narrowed and broke, producing satellite droplets. Kornev et al. filmed these events with a high frame rate camera and macro lens, to study them in detail.
They concluded that within seconds after leaving the body, caterpillar hemolymph changes from a low-viscous into a viscoelastic fluid. Related StoriesThe scientists further used optical phase-contrast and polarized microscopy, X-ray imaging, and materials science modeling to study the cellular processes by which hemocytes aggregate to form a crust over a wound. They did this not only in Carolina sphinx moths and their caterpillars, but also in 18 other insect species.
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