DANGEROUS BEETLE THAT EJECTS FIRE AND POISON

DANGEROUS BEETLE THAT EJECTS FIRE AND POISON

 PROF WAQAR HUSSAIN

  

                  One day my son Zawar Hussain was typing an article for me on the computer. Suddenly he felt burning under his left foot along with a popping sound and he quickly lifted his foot and found a beetle crawling on the carpet. He started feeling pain and irritation in foot. He screamed in agony and we all rushed towards him. At that                 moment, he was holding his foot in his hand and was murmuring

 in pain. We saw a “five-day moon” shaped dark brown spot on his foot and the attacker was lying half dead on the carpet. He reported that this beetle has bombarded a missile of fire when he incidentally placed foot on it. I washed the stain of burnt area with ethanol and the stain slightly fainted and burning stopped. There was also a “five-day moon”    shaped mark of dark 

brown colour on the carpet at the place of incidence. I tried to wash it with alcohol but in vain.

         Finding him well! We all started examining the beetle by placing it on the white paper. When molested with 

straw, the beetle squirted about a drop of liquid which stained paper yellow, indicating the toxin is of yellow colour. The beetle had a dark brown stiff coating having patches of yellow colour. After 30 minutes the beetle died. In the meanwhile, my 

children(Amsar Hussain, Zawar Hussain, Nisar Hussain and Sadaf Fatima) started questioning about the beetle’s habitat, food, reason of attack, mechanism of attack, chemistry of fire and toxin, effect of spurt, cause of beetle’s illness and later on death, etc. All my answers are stated below for benefit of the readers.

             It is called bombardier beetle, inhabitant of all continents except Antarctica.It is present in almost every house in Pakistan in good numbers. It is carnivorous and hunts for other insects at night. It has more than 500 species with unique defense mechanism. When disturbed, the beetle ejects a noxious chemical with popping sound in rapid burst from a gland present in abdomen. Beetle first produces and then stores two chemical; hydroquinone and 

hydrogen peroxide in separate pouches present in rear tip of its abdomen. When threatened, the bombardier beetle contracts muscles that force two compounds to flow through valve tube into a thick walled “combustion chamber” lined with cells that secret catalases and peroxidase enzymes. When two compounds combine, a violent 

exothermic reaction takes place as enzymes decompose H₂O₂ into H₂O and atomic oxygen and also oxidise hydroquinone into para-quinone and atomic hydrogen. Keep in mind atomic oxygen or atomic hydrogen is extremely reactive. The popping sound generates due to rapid formation of gases that expand and rush towards area of low pressure as the pressure of gases increase 1000 times so its 

principle is similar to that of other explosives. The reactions also generate heat which escalate temperature to 100⁰C (boiling point of water) and vaporize 20% of mixture (some water converts to steam) which gushes out of the body due to escalated pressure. The vaporized gases and steam exert pressure which closes the entry valve of combustion chamber, thus protecting the internal organ of the beetle from venom produced. The boiling, foul smelling liquid cum gaseous mixture is expelled through outlet nozzle into the atmosphere with a loud popping sound. These hot gases burn its enemy and the poison kills them. Astonishingly, the entire process of pumping of compounds into combustion chamber, enzyme catalyzed reactions and ejection of product takes place in 500^th part of a second. It shoots boiling liquid and gases 70 times in quick succession that can travel as far as 20 cm. Its attack is fatal for insects and painful to human skin. The ejection barrel of beetle can swivel through 270^o and can hit missile on the face of insects. So, beetle can fire in multiple directions that too with immense accuracy.

          Hydroquinone is an organic compound containing benzene ring and two hydroxyl groups at para position. It undergoes oxidation to p-Quinone (poison for insects and toxic for man) which is then ejected. Para-Quinone is bright yellow crystalline solid with pungent smell. It stains skin dark brown and causes erythema (inflammation of skin in patches) and leads to local tissue necrosis (death of tissues). It is also carcinogenic. It can easily pass into the blood stream and depresses the bone marrow production and can inhabit protease enzyme in cellular apoptosis (death of cells). It is slightly soluble in water and soluble in acetone (nail polish remover) and very soluble in ethanol (available in the West as alcohol and in Pakistan as methylated spirit).

                So, whenever someone is hit by chemically loaded incendiary missile of bombardier beetle, one should clean the stain with ethanol that will surely antidote the toxin of beetle and will also pacify the burns.

           Now the question arises, why attacker beetle became ill and half dead after attack and latter on died? The answer is that when it squirted, my son lifted his foot and in this struggle some pressure was exerted on beetle and all its toxic material did not come out. And due to pressure rear valve of combustion chamber slightly opened, thus some toxin entered into its own body. Due to effect of toxin, it became half dead and finally died proving the maxim, “The one who digs a pit will fall into it, and whoever rolls a stone- it will come back on him.”