14 DAY TRIAL // This is too fast for our eye. The soldiers of a lowly termite, Termes panamensis, snap their jaws at a speed that bypasses any other muscle-powered movement of any species.
Marc Seid and Jeremy Niven of the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute in Panama revealed that termites reach a speed of 70.4 m (220 ft) per second, even if over a distance of only 1.76 mm. But in the microworld of the termites this is more than enough. The researchers managed to measure the speed by filming the termite's jaws at 40,000 frames per second.
Unlike in ants, the termite soldiers are sterile individuals of both sexes, not just females. Termite soldiers are armed with huge jaws, or can emit a sticky toxic substance (in South American species).
A termite's jaws have some special properties that provide power and speed. When menaced by an intruder, the termite jams its mouthparts against each other employing four sets of muscles so large that they fill half of the volume inside the insect's head. The pent-up power is what permits it to snap its jaws past one another at such incredible speed in the intruder's face. The termite's jaws work like a saw, biting with incredible strength.
"This helps a termite defend its nest in the restricted space of the animals' burrows," Seid and Niven told the International Congress of Neuroethology in Vancouver, Canada.
Before this research, a team at University of South Florida had found earlier this year that the fastest muscle in the animal world was the tongue of the giant palm salamander of Central America, Bolitoglossa dofleini, at 14.2 m (43 ft) per second.
Bolitoglossa salamanders hunt exactly in the style of the chameleons, extending their tongue (which measures more than half of their body) in about 7 milliseconds, 50 times faster than an eye blink. Now, their performances look rudimentary, as the termites are 5 times faster.