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Fetish or fear

FETISH OR FEAR?

Dr Babita Yadav

 

THE UNUSUAL WAYS IN WHICH  INSECTS HAVE INSPIRED HUMAN BEINGS.

Insects are the most diverse form of animals. There evolution dates back to approximately 480 million years ago and they have been known to coexist with human beings either as harmless, beneficial or as harmful pests, and later category being most dreaded as. But, in reality insects are more than what most of us think as. They have been mentioned in our ancient puranas too for instance Maa Bhramari devi considered as an aspect of Mata Durga, is associated with bees, and hence bees are considered as holiest insects.

Normally when insects are mentioned, feelings of awe or disgust arise, but are they really that offensive? Insect lovers or entomophilies have different opinion about the insects and for such people insects have been source of inspiration.

It’s true that most of the insects are destructive either as carrier of most deadly diseases or as pests, be it crop pest or household one. But then there are many insects that are beneficial and productive. There are number of insect’s species like bees, bumblebees, hoverflies beetles, wasps and butterflies which are responsible for pollination of many plants. Honey bees and lac insects are well known productive insects.

But there are few bizarre ways in which insects have created an impact on us. So, herein we discuss about those unusual uses of insects.

Insect jewelry: insects have been used a jewelry since long time. During Egyptian and Mayan period beetles were worn as ornaments. Few of the insects are truly beautiful and colorful, good enough to be adorned as jewels. For instance elytra of jewel beetle belonging to family Bupresitidae is used in ornaments like earrings, necklaces, bangles etc. the colour of the elytra being beautifully iridescent is suitable for using it as piece of any  jewelry. 

Jewel beetle

 

Use of caddisfly larvae to create jewelry: larvae of caddisfly belonging to order Trichoptera normally found in rivers and they spin a temporary cocoons by using their saliva as mortar to seal twigs, sand particles and small pebbles. But a self taught French artist Hubart Duprat got an idea to use them to spin a cocoon made of gold and pearls and when he experimented the idea, results were astonishingly unique tiny sculptures.

 

Caddis fly larave

So, some designers have moved beyond the “ick” factor, and experimented too far with insects as jewelry. For instance, fashion designer Jared Gold included live insect jewelry in form of bejeweled roach brooch trend in 2006. Though the trend was short lived but had earned lot of popularity.

In Yucatan region of Mexico where the Maquech Beetle of family Zopheridae is found in large number, there is a fad of wearing them as live ornaments. The beetles are bedazzled by gems, and shiny paints, tied up with tiny chains jewelry.

Maquech beetle

Although these trends have been often challenged by PETA as it involves cruelty according to animal right activists.

Insect used to make alcohol: Entomophagy i.e. eating insects as food is common in many parts of the world now days as it is considered to be an environmental friendly protein source. But an insect used for producing alcohol is relatively recent.  Though, it’s been long since insects have been used in coloration of wine. Campri, an Italian alcoholic made in 1860 by Gaspare Campari in Novara, Italy. The drink gets its red tinge from natural red dye carmine from crushed cochineal insects. But lately, insects have been directly used to produce distinctly flavored alcohol. Recently a Tokyo based startup named Join earth; launched cricket based craft brew with collaboration with a Tono brewing. According to Press release, cricket were grass fed and then roasted and brewed with malt to produce ale which tastes like roasted caramel.

Campri wine

In 2014, the Cambridge distillery collaborated with Rene Redzepi’s Nordic Food Lab in o produce the Anty Gin, which contains the distillate of red wood ants, along with nettle and some wild wood herbs. The gin is said to have “sharp citrus notes”, because of Red wood ants.

 

Anty Gin

Thailand produces bamboo worm vodka which is triple distilled rice grain spirit infused with farm reared bamboo worms (Omphisa fuscidentalis), steeped for several months before it is served. It is majorly sold by a company known as ‘Thailand Unique’.

Bamboo worm vodka

Insects as sniffers: Insects use olfactory senses to trace their source of food, mates and to sense danger etc. Research has shown that insect have sophisticated sensory mechanism to smell odors. That’s why researchers are trying to find new methods to use insects like crickets, bees and locusts to trace land mining explosives or illegal drugs. Associative learning can be effectively used for chemical detection as insects are highly sensitive, easy to carry and are cost effective too.

The practice of using insects as sniffers is at its nascent stage and the research work is still going on. But the prospects are highly promising. Research team at Los Alamos National Laboratory have improvised a method for training the common honey bee to sense the explosives material. Using the knowledge based on bees behaviour especially about their exceptional olfactory senses , the scientist have trained the bees to express response (e.g. proboscis extension) by using pavlovian techniques towards the odors of vapors from TNT ,C4, TATP explosives and propellants.  (source: https://www.nbcnews.com/id/wbna16112401)

Dr Baranidharan Raman, Professor of Biomedical Engineering and his colleagues at the Washington University in St. Louis have experimented on locust which has incredible olfactory senses to detect explosives by implanting   electrodes to the antennal lobes of the insect. He says it’s literally hijacking the locust to use it as detector for sniffing explosives.(source: https://www.yalescientific.org/2022/05/on-the-path-to-bomb-sniffing-insects%EF%BF%BC/)

In similar kind of studies, Ben Maoz, a biomedical engineer at Tel Aviv University, Israel and co-author of the study, connected the antenna of a locust to a small, wheeled robotic device and exposed it to sense different odors including explosives and drugs. At the same time he cleared that the studies are still at super preliminary stage of development but believes its possible.(source: https://www.indiatimes.com/technology/science-and-future/robot-gets-the-sense-of-smell-using-locust-antennae-590586.html)

Suggested readings:

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/33401414/

https://www.thailandunique.com/other-thai-products/drinks/bamboo-worm-vodka-60ml

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Campari

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_interactions_with_insects

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Live_insect_jewelry#/media/File:Zopheridae_jewelry_sjh.jpg

https://www.thisiscolossal.com/2014/07/hubert-duprat-caddisflies/

https://www.hinduscriptures.com/vedic-culture/divine-matters/insects-in-hinduism/40303/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buprestidae

https://cambridgedistillery.co.uk/products/anty-gin

https://biomimicry.org/

https://edukemy.com/daily-current-affairs/sniffing-robot-with-locust-antennae/2023-02-09

 

                                                            

 

 

                                                            

 

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