Termites Eating Wood Symbiotic Relationship

However termites could not feed on wood without the help of symbiotic protistsliving in their guts.

Termites eating wood symbiotic relationship. This sugar is what termites are able to absorb within their stomachs. Unlike lower termites xylophagous higher termites thrive on wood without the aid of symbiotic protists. These protists take in wood particles. How this symbiosis works.

Termites rely upon a regime of symbiotic gut protists and prokaryote bacteria to digest the wood. In contrast lower termites typically have flagellates and prokaryotes in their hindguts. A newborn termite gets protozoa by eating the feces of older termites which has protozoa in it. Due to a symbiotic relationship with a strain of bacteria in their gut they are able to eat and digest wood.

These protozoa actually break down the wood inside the termite producing by products that both organisms can digest. Instead there are microorganisms living inside the termite s digestive system called protozoa. Without it they would die for sure. Although termites are insects that eat wood termites are not capable of digesting wood on their own.

They are responsible for consuming detritus and deadfall in nature providing an essential service to the ecology. For at least 250 million years the symbionts within the termite gut have evolved along with their termite hosts. All termites eat wood yet cannot digest it. Without them the host will die without the termite they die.

As we know termites eat a tremendous amount of dead wood and they actually have great ability to efficiently digest and extract energy from wood. In the higher termite nasutitermes takasagoen. Termites of course are famous as the organisms that eat wood often the wood in your house. That is why termites are always known for inhabiting and eating wooded areas.

In the picture of trichonymphabelow in the lower portion of the cell. Termites termites are among the most well known of the wood eating insects. Though termites do feed on cellulose within wood the termites themselves do not actually digest the wood. Cellulose digestion in higher termites has co evolved with eukaryotic gut microbiota and many genera have symbiotic relationships with fungi such as termitomyces.

Endosymbionts that live within the intestines of the termite assist in converting the wood into nutrients that the termite is able to digest.