Corpse Cleaners of the Wild: How Insects Keep Death from Piling Up

Corpse Cleaners of the Wild: How Insects Keep Death from Piling Up

Sylvia Duruson

Death is everywhere in nature, yet we rarely see rotting carcasses littering the ground. What invisible force keeps our world from becoming a gruesome graveyard of decay? The answer lies in the tiny, often overlooked heroes working tirelessly behind the scenes. Insects, nature’s most efficient cleanup crew, transform death into life with remarkable precision and ...

Insects as Sustainable Protein: Could They Solve World Hunger?

Insects as Sustainable Protein: Could They Solve World Hunger?

Sylvia Duruson

Picture this: you’re sitting down to dinner, and on your plate is a delicious, protein-packed meal that required 2,000 times less water to produce than beef, generated virtually no greenhouse gases, and took up almost no land to farm. Sounds impossible? Welcome to the world of entomophagy – eating insects. While many Western cultures recoil ...

What Happens When You Play Music to Insects?

What Happens When You Play Music to Insects?

Sylvia Duruson

The tiny spider freezes mid-web as classical music fills the air. A bee hovers longer near your speaker, seemingly entranced by jazz rhythms. You might think this sounds like fantasy, but scientists worldwide are discovering that insects respond to music in ways that challenge everything we thought we knew about these miniature creatures. From fruit ...

Spider Silk Stronger Than Steel: Can We Use It in Bulletproof Vests?

Spider Silk Stronger Than Steel: Can We Use It in Bulletproof Vests?

Sylvia Duruson

Imagine a material five times stronger than steel, yet flexible enough to stretch like rubber. This isn’t science fiction – it’s hanging in the corner of your garage right now. Every day, millions of spiders across the world are producing one of nature’s most extraordinary materials, spinning silk that puts our strongest synthetic fibers to ...

Two-spotted Tree Cricket singing

Insect Musicians: The Bugs That Sing, Click, and Rattle

Sylvia Duruson

Step outside on a warm summer evening and you’ll hear it – nature’s greatest symphony playing all around you. The crickets chirping their rhythmic melodies, the cicadas buzzing their electric songs, and countless other tiny performers creating a soundscape that rivals any human orchestra. These insect musicians have been perfecting their craft for millions of ...

Demodex folliculorum

Mites on Your Face: The Microscopic Insects That Live in Your Pores

Sylvia Duruson

Right now, as you’re reading this, thousands of tiny creatures are crawling across your face. They’re living in your pores, feeding on your dead skin cells, and reproducing in the oily depths of your hair follicles. You can’t see them, you can’t feel them, but they’re there—and they’ve been your constant companions since birth. Meet ...

Close-up image of caterpillar, chrysalis, and adult butterfly stages

The Insect That Turns Into a Puddle and Rebuilds Itself From Scratch

Sylvia Duruson

Imagine watching an insect literally melt before your eyes, dissolving into what looks like green soup, only to witness it reassemble itself days later into a completely different creature. This isn’t science fiction – it’s the mind-bending reality of metamorphosis, one of nature’s most spectacular magic tricks. While most people know butterflies transform from caterpillars, ...

The Hawaiian Yellow Crazy Ant: A U.S. Invasive That’s Hard to Kill

Sylvia Duruson

Picture this: you’re walking through a tropical paradise, surrounded by lush green vegetation and the gentle sound of waves crashing nearby. But beneath your feet, millions of tiny golden warriors are waging an invisible war that’s changing the very fabric of this ecosystem. The Hawaiian yellow crazy ant might sound like something out of a ...