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  • Review Article
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Mechanisms of insect respiration

Nature Reviews Physics volume 7, pages 135–148 (2025)Cite this article

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Abstract

Insect respiration is characterized by the rapid transport of respiratory gases within the organism and efficient exchange with the external environment. The unique respiratory system of insects comprises a network of tracheal tubes that directly supply oxygen to the cells throughout the body of an insect, eliminating the need for blood as an intermediate oxygen carrier. The remarkable diversity of insects and their exceptionally high aerobic scope, possibly the highest in the animal kingdom, demonstrate the success of their respiratory strategy. Microfluidic technology, particularly in the domain of gas microfluidics, also stands to benefit from emulating the mechanical proficiency demonstrated by insects in manipulating fluids at the microscale. Despite this significance, current understanding of the fundamental principles underlying insect respiration is incomplete. This Review presents an overview of insect respiratory physics and identifies promising areas for future investigations.

Key points

  • Insects achieve some of the highest mass-specific metabolic rates in the animal kingdom owing to their unique, efficient respiratory systems that rapidly transport oxygen directly to the tissues.

  • The flow physics of insect respiration is notable because the respiratory airflows of insects involve both low Reynolds numbers and high Knudsen numbers, placing them simultaneously in the slow, creeping and rarefied flow regimes — an unusual intersection.

  • The respiratory efficiency of insects may also be attributed to hydrodynamic slip in a substantial proportion of tracheae, which reduces viscous losses.

  • Respiratory air flows in the rhythmic tracheal compression regime may be actuated and controlled via a single actuation signal — the abdominal compression frequency of an insect — working in conjunction with the intelligent, distributed, passive collapse mechanics of the tracheal network.

  • Mathematical, computational and microfluidic models of insect respiration are essential for deepening our understanding of insect respiratory mechanisms and for translating their highly efficient microscale fluid-handling strategies into technologies.

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Fig. 1: The three broad patterns of gas exchange in insects are continuous, cyclic and discontinuous gas exchange.
Fig. 2: Mechanisms exist for reducing viscous losses in both mammalian and insect oxygen delivery pathways.
Fig. 3: Tracheal collapse drives convective airflow in insect respiration.
Fig. 4: The unique respiratory systems of insects transport oxygen directly to tissues via tracheal networks, bypassing the need for blood as an intermediate carrier and thereby achieving some of the highest aerobic scopes and mass-specific metabolic rates in the animal kingdom.
Fig. 5: Multiscale irregularities and disorder may enhance fluid-mediated transport in insect respiratory systems.

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Acknowledgements

A.E.S. discloses support for this work from the US National Science Foundation (grant numbers 0938047, 1437387 and 2014181). S.K. discloses support for this work from the BIOTRANS Interdisciplinary Graduate Education Program at Virginia Tech. The authors thank J. Socha, S. Wilmsen and K. Adjerid for many helpful discussions.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Mechanical Engineering, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA, USA

    Saadbin Khan & Anne E. Staples

  2. Center for the Mathematics of Biosystems, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA, USA

    Anne E. Staples

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  1. Saadbin Khan
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A.E.S. conceived this Review; S.K. formed the bibliography, wrote the article and created the initial figures. A.E.S. guided the article structure and development and conceived the Murray’s law additions discussed in the article. Both authors reviewed and edited the article extensively.

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Correspondence to Saadbin Khan or Anne E. Staples.

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Glossary

Haemolymph

Blood analogue in the open circulatory system of invertebrates, composed of plasma and haemocytes, transporting nutrients, hormones, metabolites and antimicrobial peptides (AMPs) to inhibit bacterial growth.

Knudsen number

In the context of insect respiration, the Knudsen number is defined as the ratio of the molecular mean free path of air to the characteristic length scale of the tracheal system, the tracheal diameter.

Oxidative stress

A condition wherein reactive oxygen molecules exceed the ability of the body to neutralize them, causing potential damage to cellular components such as proteins, lipids and DNA.

Plastron

In aquatic biology, a plastron is an air-retaining structure used for underwater respiration.

Ramifying

A process which refers to branching into successively smaller branches.

Taenidial

Pertaining to taenidia, which are spiral circumferential thickenings on the inner wall of insect tracheae and tracheoles, preventing airway collapse.

Unsteady Reynolds number

Numbers that are often defined for a fluid system with cyclic motions; they encode frequency information and represent the ratio of unsteady inertial forces to viscous forces in the system.

Womersley numbers

Dimensionless numbers for cyclic internal fluid flows that represent the relative importance of transient inertial forces compared to viscous forces in the system; an unsteady Reynolds number.

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Khan, S., Staples, A.E. Mechanisms of insect respiration. Nat Rev Phys 7, 135–148 (2025). https://doi.org/10.1038/s42254-025-00811-x

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