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Updated: Jul 12, 2026

An Experimental and Bioinformatics Protocol for RNA-seq Analyses of Photoperiodic Diapause in the Asian Tiger Mosquito, Aedes albopictus
Published on: November 30, 2014
Mechanism allowing an insect to survive complete dehydration and extreme temperatures
M Watanabe1, T Kikawada, N Minagawa
1National Institute of Agrobiological Sciences, Ohwashi 1-2, Tsukuba, Ibaraki 305-8634, Japan.
Abstract:
Cryptobiosis describes the state of an organism whose body water is completely dehydrated and metabolic activity has become undetectable. Our study aimed to elucidate the physiological mechanism of cryptobiosis in the highest cryptobiotic invertebrate, Polypedilum vanderplanki. Larvae of this insect rapidly accumulated a large amount of the carbohydrate, trehalose, (18% of dry body mass) during desiccation for 2 days, suggesting that a high level of trehalose accumulation contributed to the successful induction of cryptobiosis in P. vanderplanki as well as in other lower cryptobiotic organisms. When larvae deprived of the brain, suboesophageal ganglion (SG) and thoracic ganglia (TG) were completely dehydrated and then rehydrated, they were able to recover and move actively. During desiccation, such larvae also accumulated trehalose, although only about half as much as the intact larvae. It is concluded that the brain, SG and TG do not affect the induction and termination of cryptobiosis, and hence in this higher multicellular animal cryptobiosis is independent of brain, SG and TG regulation, just as in plants or in unicellular organisms.
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