The Insane Biology of: The Dune Sandworm

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Credits:
Narrator: Stephanie Sammann
Writer: Ashleen Knutsen
Illustrator: Jacek Ambrożewski
3D Animator: Stijn Orlans
Thumbnail: Stijn Orlans

References:

[DomyTheMad]

i genuinely love the idea that nerds across generations and science have written freaking papers on a fictional animal and planet.
"just because it isn't real, does not mean it can't be fascinating!"

[kepler]

my marine biology teacher told me a funny story about how he had students that were doing a report on marine sandworms but all their sources were mistakenly referenced to Dune wiki forums. My teacher had to stop the presentation once he realized what was going on

[colinsmith]

Another fun fact about the sandworms. Inside the Dune universe, they are the ONLY confirmed non-terrestrial life. Everything else was seeded from Earth originally, but the Sand Trout were brought to Arrakis from... somewhere undefined, and show no trace of terrestrial origin.

[envviro]

Im honestly way more interested in the worldbuilding of Dune than the actual story. The giant sand worms, the way spice is formed and harvested, the way the Fremen have adapted to the harsh desert climate of Arrakis. I find all of that so fascinating.

[rammstein]

Regarding the sand worm's heat exchange, I'm reading the third book right now and it's stated that the tail end of the sand worm is blisteringly hot so you have to avoid it when you're getting off a sand worm. That's probably how they shed their excess heat, in addition to being much more heat tolerant in general.

[LaineyBug]

My head canon was that they were silicon based life forms and that's why they worked so well breaking down and metabolizing the sand, minerals and metals at every stage of their lives.

As sand plankton, they filter feed with a symbiotic colony of bacteria that they host. The bacteria feed on yeast that grows wild on the grains of sand and other substrates that the sand plankton consume. Since labs have been able to synthesize psilocybin from bacteria that feed on yeast, I theorize that a similar process is what gives the melange it's psychoactive properties. This digestive process also provides the O2 and other gasses that make up the planet's atmosphere.

The sand plankton would reproduce asexually with budding polyps so there's always a growing and thriving population for the base of the food chain. Their imperative at this stage would just be to eat and reproduce. They would be able survive in dry and wet conditions. In God Emperor of Dune, when a sand worm falls into a river, it breaks down completely into sand plankton and is able to survive so a new cycle of worms can be started.

When conditions are right, perhaps when the sand plankton have built up enough nutrients, they instinctively come together into sand trout. The sand trout can still break down and metabolize particulates from the sand or other substrates, and they feed on the plankton to maintain their stores of the bacteria and yeast and to absorb supplemental nutrients from them.

While there is a certain level of moisture in the environment, sand trout is the highest form they will take. Their imperative is to eat and sequester water so they can band together and morph into their final forms.

When enough water has been sequestered, the sand trout instinctively band together into the sand worms and form Little Makers that grow into Shai-Hulud. The sand worms are always churning away like any good detritivore, only instead of plant materials, they break down silicates, other minerals and metals. If they have any bone like structures besides their teeth, these are the what they are made of. This is why their teeth make such great Crysknives. They are described as being ivory like, as hard as steel and gleaming like a crystal almost lit from within. They also feed on the sand plankton and sand trout to supplement their nutrition and help produce their spice essences which would work similarly to plasma. The friction from their locomotion ignites the particulates which aids in their break down and fuels their internal furnace that in turn expells gasses like O2 and H20 back into the atmosphere. The sand retains most of the H20 which is further sequestered by the sand trout.

Sand worms may reproduce with a combination of broadcast spawning and budding, which may be another way for them to spread the desert. They would leave a budding segment as close to the moisture as they can get. These buds can normally survive on their own and become another Little Makers then Shai-Hulud, but if the environment it too moist, they'd 'die' and break back down into sand plankton. Then the cycle would start all over and thus spread the desert. Alternatively, two or more sand worms could leave their buds in the same space so there would be a chance for sharing DNA when the sand plankton eventually reform into sand trout.

Thank you for coming to my Dune Talk!

[nova]

Absolutely love this!! Just saw Dune for the first time and I immediately fell in love with the sandworms, absolutely fascinated with how they might work. This video is such a fun exploration of that concept!

[alanhat]

7:52 sand is a good insulator, it's cooler below the surface.

[Kekoapono]

It's great to see more than a just a few frames of you on camera, You did very well! You pushed yourself to do something new and the results were fantastic!

[Kholdstare]

If oxygen is a excretion of sandworms does that mean every time they breach the surface, theyre sticking their faces into an atmosphere/ocean of their own farts?

[Mike-kcew]

Great video! I just wish you would have expanded a little more on the subject of how water is toxic to them. That raises a lot of questions, like, how can they eat very many people and still be alive?

[pronoydutta]

The sandworm were said to have furnace like insides, similar to a combustion engine. They had an extremely strong aversion to water. That's the most dramatic feature for me aside from spice creation.

They're like organic 'fire hoses'.

[MrSalvarion]

You're doing great on cam. And it was quite fun to watch as an old Dune fan.

Many years ago I saw a video somewhat like this speculating over a plausible biology for dragons. They addressed the need for more stomachs and a digestive system, almost like cows, to build up and hold methane, to "lighten" their total body weight making them able to fly (even with hollow bones the skeleton was to large a portion of the body to let them fly otherwise).
They also used the methane to breathe fire in rival combats, which was often ended by one part not having enough methane left to both fight and fly.
To actually be able to make the fire, they also suggested that they'd have to have minerals as a part of their diet (apart from ofc grass for making the methane). This could potentially mean, that through their diet, they also get a catalyst mineral to spark the fire when they breathe out the methane (in high pressure ofc to avoid a blow back).
All in all a very funny and interesting way of making a fantasy creature plausible.

[mayceehash]

I had to do a double take when I realize you were on camera. Congrats for putting yourself out there. I think it's a great addition to your format.

[blairistic]

Did Frank Herbert ever say how much gravity was on Dune? If Dune has less gravity, then the worms would be better able to handle their own mass. But then you'd have to explain why humans walk similar to earth-bound humans; maybe you could say that the Harkkonens and Atraiedes homeworlds also have less gravity, so people have adapted to that level of gravity

[NewNormac]

You’re great on camera, I know that may not help the nerves but you’ve got what it takes!!! Thanks for stretching through the tough stuff and being an awesome example

[danchadwick]

There's another way to get rid of heat as we do in the refrigeration industry. Sandworms compress heat within itself and shifts the operation to Silicate based in the range of a thousand degrees. Another operation neglected is electrical welding and cutting, 3d construction, and friction resistance. The substance found in the chrisknife is foundational through out bone and skin structure of the sandworm. Spice would be electrical-neurological binding to all the nerves whether to the sheathe or integral to the nerve, functions as adding processing power attuned to the neurological electrical activity. Not carbon based, therefore indigestible.

[alanhat]

7:26 ceramics? Several 'problems' would all go away at once as ceramics also cope well with heat & can be abrasion resistant.

[fabrisseterbrugghe]

Thank you for including sand plankton and sand trout. I hate that the movies leave out these crucial stages. The fact that the Fremen children will snack on the sand trout for liquid has always struck me.

[k-dog]

All hail the silicon-based caffeine worm!

One question I’d still like answered is how they would move so fast through sand. Sand is extremely heavy and doesn’t exactly move like a liquid but they seem to make it do so with the harmonic vibration they emit. Are there any examples of organisms on Earth that do something similar?