YouTube: https://youtube.com/watch?v=tmsG5umrmgc
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View count:209,504
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Duration:00:43
Uploaded:2023-04-21
Last sync:2024-10-27 01:15

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MLA Full: "These bugs are constantly peeing. #shorts #science #SciShow." YouTube, uploaded by SciShow, 21 April 2023, www.youtube.com/watch?v=tmsG5umrmgc.
MLA Inline: (SciShow, 2023)
APA Full: SciShow. (2023, April 21). These bugs are constantly peeing. #shorts #science #SciShow [Video]. YouTube. https://youtube.com/watch?v=tmsG5umrmgc
APA Inline: (SciShow, 2023)
Chicago Full: SciShow, "These bugs are constantly peeing. #shorts #science #SciShow.", April 21, 2023, YouTube, 00:43,
https://youtube.com/watch?v=tmsG5umrmgc.
If you've ever felt like you pee a lot, you've got nothing on the sharpshooter bug. They pee like, literally all the time, and they've found a neat trick to get all that waste away from them - they use a physics trick called superpropulsion that's so powerful, we're trying to use it to launch rockets!

Hosted by: Savannah Geary (they/them)

Emma Barratt: Writer
Courtney Tern : Fact Checker
Amy Peterson: Script Editor
Madison Lynn: Videographer
Stefan Chin: Script Supervisor
Savannah Geary: Editor, Associate Producer
Nate Biehl: Animator
Daniel Comiskey: Editorial Director
Sarah Suta: Producer
Caitlin Hofmeister: Executive Producer
Hank Green: Executive Producer

Sources:
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-023-36376-5
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/sharpshooter-insects-use-superpropulsion-to-catapult-their-pee1/
https://arstechnica.com/science/2023/02/watch-these-glassy-winged-sharpshooters-fling-pee-bubbles-with-anal-catapult/

Image Sources:
https://www.eurekalert.org/multimedia/976108
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8eAb26nQa6s
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-023-36376-5/figures/1
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Broad-headed_Sharpshooter_-_Oncometopia_orbona,_Julie_Metz_Wetlands,_Woodbridge,_Virginia_-_28908389724.jpg
Savannah: These bugs are always peeing.

They're called "sharpshooter bugs," and they take in a lot of water. But since waste can be smelly, they need to deal with all that pee without giving away their location to predators. So what do they do?

Well, for starters, they only release their waste one droplet at a time. They scoop it up with an organ called and "anal stylus," which they use to fling the pee away. And they manage to get some serious speed on the toss, around 40% faster than the stylus launches them, thanks to superpropulsion. A droplet will gain momentum when it's launched, and compression changes its shape, making it sort of oblong. Then, surface pressure snaps the droplet back into a sphere, converting the potential energy into kinetic energy and adding some serious speed.

Superpropulsion may even be able to improve the efficiency of rocket launches, so it's extra impressive that these little bugs figured it out.

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