Isopod

Isopods are animals that belong to the order Isopoda, a subset of crustaceans. They fall under the Arthropod phylum. Most of the estimated ten thousand species of isopod are native to aquatic environments. The most common example of the terrestrial isopod is the woodlouse, also known as the pill bug or roly-poly.

Isopods are considered very diverse, especially among their fellow crustacean orders. The smallest species are microscopic, while the largest can exceed a foot in length. Marine isopod habitats range from the deep sea to freshwater, shoreliness, and groundwater.

Their diet and feeding methods also vary greatly. The marine species typically eat meat. Some browse, some are predators, some scavenge, and others use filtering to eat small organisms. Many isopods are parasitic, living on the bodies of larger fish and sucking their blood. Terrestrial isopods often eat rotting wood, fungi, and other plant life.

Background

The lifespan of isopods can vary between a few months and a few years, depending on the species. Most isopods lack the shells common among other crustaceans. They do have exoskeletons, as well as a series of overlapping plates that offer some defense, while allowing the animal a wide range of motion, such as the woodlouse's ability to curl into a ball. Like insects, isopod bodies can be separated into three segments. From the animal's front to back, they are the head, thorax, and abdomen. An isopod's physical structure is even further segmented. The thorax—also called pereon when referring to isopods—is made up of seven individual segments known as pereonites. Each segment has a pair of limbs, or pereopods. These are used almost exclusively for mobility.

An isopod's abdomen, or pleon, consists of six segments. Each segment has forked limbs called pleopods. In most species, these are shorter and broader than the pereopods. They perform gas exchange, providing oxygen and expelling gas waste, functionally serving as marine isopods' gills. They can also help propel isopods forward.

As they grow, isopods molt, shedding their outermost layer entirely. Unlike many other molting creatures, isopods molt in two distinct phases. They first shed their rear half, then their front. Depending on the species, the duration of a molt and the amount of time between shedding the two halves can vary drastically.

Isopod reproduction is tied to molting habits. Females develop eggs as the time to molt approaches, and males transfer sperm, which is held in a specialized chamber in the female's body until the molt. At that time, the female lays hundreds of eggs, storing them within a protective cavity in her underside called the marsupium. The isopods spend some time developing there, and are finally released in a juvenile state. Unlike other crustaceans, they already have the same basic structure and appearance of their adult selves. Younger isopods differ from adults in that they have just six pereonites and are somewhat smaller.

Impact

The rare opportunities to observe giant isopods have been important for marine biology. The giant isopod is notable for its size compared to most other isopods: The largest known specimens were greater than one foot in length. Humans have found comparatively very few large specimens, mostly because their primary habitat is several hundred feet below the ocean surface and deeper. The earliest discoveries of them in the late nineteenth century helped scientists move away from the then-popular Azoic hypothesis, which stated that ocean life was exclusive to the first few hundred feet of depth. It also serves as a docile, easily studied example of deep-sea gigantism, the concept of creatures living in the deep ocean growing much larger than related species living in more shallow territories.

Because humans have rarely interacted with live giant isopods, not much is known about these creatures. One specimen lived in captivity for five years without eating before it died, leading to many questions about their metabolism and diet. They are known to scavenge fish carcasses, since they have been caught in baited traps set by fishermen.

Other isopods have developed different physical traits to feed in different ways. Certain parasitic isopods have hooked pereopods that help them latch onto fish for long-term situations. Filter feeders have a few pereopods that are longer and sport hair-like growths. They wave these through the water, entangling tiny organisms on which they feed.

Woodlice are the isopods that laypeople are most likely to encounter in everyday life. They are extremely common in North America and Southern Europe. Woodlice and humans have both benefited from each other's presence. Unlike insects, woodlice are incapable of surviving in temperatures much colder than the freezing point. They're also much more vulnerable to dehydration. Human structures provide shelter, heat sources, and moisture, allowing woodlice to thrive in regions that would be otherwise lethal to them.

Although woodlice can be found congregating around man-made structures and can occasionally find their way inside houses—particularly in cold weather—they are harmless and pose no threat to architecture or agriculture. Since they cannot survive long in dry environments, live woodlice within a home likely indicate a leak. Otherwise, woodlice found indoors are typically dead from dehydration. Woodlice primarily feed on rotting matter, and usually leave live crops and other plants intact. In fact, their role as decomposers makes them useful for maintaining farms, gardens, and yards. Woodlice can even remove metal contaminants from soil. They can process several types of heavy metal and expel them above the ground in crystallized form without experiencing any ill effects. This helps keep soil healthy and viable even in areas with metal-based waste.

Though woodlice are extremely vulnerable to dehydration, they do have methods of collecting and preserving available moisture. While aquatic isopods use gas exchange to take in oxygen, terrestrial isopods use it to draw in water vapor, absorbing moisture from the surrounding air. Their well-known ability to curl into a ball serves not only for defense against predators, but to retain moisture.

Bibliography

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