... by activity and (2) a decrease in water loss rate with increasing starvation level, by a decrease in cuticular water loss during the first 5 days after feeding and a drop in the respiratory component thereafter. We calculated the surface area of the insects and estimated cuticular permeability. In addition...

... days of removal from their gall. Contrary to most previous reports, a large majority of the increased desiccation resistance (∼85%) was due to reduced respiratory transpiration with the remainder being the result of a lowered cuticular permeability. Rates of cuticular water loss were reduced...

... melanogaster gas exchange water loss cuticular permeability Pogonomyrmex californicus Forelius mccooki Insects are small but their ratio of surface area to volume is large. Water, contained in body volume, diffuses through the cuticle and the spiracles to the variably dry outside world...

... loss. The water loss over the pronotal spiracles amounts to about 70 %, and is thus the dominant component of transpiratory water loss in these beetles. 30 11 1990 © 1991 by Company of Biologists 1991 Coleóptera desert water balance cuticular permeability Phrynocolus petrosus...