autothysis

[prettygoodword]

autothysis - n., a process where an animal destroys itself by rupturing an internal organ or the skin.


Practiced by some social insects such as termites and ants, by way of altruistically suicide in defense of the nest -- the result being sticky or toxic, and so trapping an invader or blocking an entrance. Coined in 1974 by Maschwitz and Maschwitz (in a paper about carpenter ants) from Greek roots auto-, self + lysis, loosen + -sis, noun ending of condition. No, I'm not sure how -l- becomes -th-.

---L.

Comments

[movingfinger.livejournal.com]

Puzzling, because autolysis is a word which means generally what this means (self-destructive rupture), without the specialization to insects. I wonder why they didn't just go with adding a layer to the existing word.

[prettygoodword.livejournal.com]

Very, very good question.