Turbinates

Other animals

Animals with respiratory turbinates can breathe faster without drying out their lungs, and consequently can have a faster metabolism. For example, when the emu exhales, its nasal turbinates condense moisture from the air and absorbs it for reuse. Dogs and other canids possess well-developed nasal turbinates. These turbinates allow for heat exchange between small arteries and veins on their maxilloturbinate (turbinates positioned on maxilla bone) surfaces in a counter-current heat-exchange system. Dogs are capable of prolonged chases, in contrast to the ambush predation of cats, and these complex turbinates play an important role in enabling this (cats only possess a much smaller and less-developed set of nasal turbinates). This same complex turbinate structure help conserve water in arid environments. The water conservation and thermoregulatory capabilities of these well-developed turbinates in dogs may have been crucial adaptations that allowed dogs (including both domestic dogs and their wild prehistoric gray wolf ancestors) to survive in the harsh Arctic environment and other cold areas of northern Eurasia and North America, which are both very dry and very cold.