How am I supposed to breathe with no air?

For many of you who experienced cicadapalooza, you probably remember these little guys hanging out on every tree for miles:

Figure 1: AHHHHHHHHHH

Well, these bad boys are the exoskeletons of cicadas, which they remove before maturing into adults. This process is called molting, and is essential in the lives of organisms that wish to "outgrow" their current form. Crazy, right? As it turns out, the story ends up getting a little crazier...

In a paper recently reported on by Science published in Freshwater Science, researchers from North Carolina State University and the Strout Water Research Center looked at the molting process in mayflies (Cloeon dipterum). They found that this process is, unfortunately, very stressful for our insect friends!

Cloeon.dipterum

Figure 2: Cloeon dipterum, the most common mayfly in the British isles.

When these mayflies remove their exoskeleton, they also shed the interior lining of their respiratory system. This would be the equivalent of you shedding your lungs...yikes! When the biologists measured the oxygen consumption rates during this process, they found that while this inner lining was being replaced, the mayflies actually held their breath for approximately 45 minutes before beginning to breathe again.

Significance? As global temperatures begin to rise, insects will begin to molt more and more. All of those periods of extreme oxygen deprivation may be harmful, but the jury is still out on whether or not holding their breath for this long actually causes tissue damage.

In the end, just be glad that you don't have an exoskeleton to shed!