The success of insects arises partly from extraordinary biochemical and physiological specializations. For example, most species lack glutathione peroxidase, glutathione reductase and respiratory-gas transport proteins and thus allow oxygen to diffuse directly into cells. To counter the increased potential for oxidative damage, insect tissues rely on the indirect protection of the thioredoxin r...

The biogenic amine, octopamine, has been proposed as the transmitter in the firefly light organ (Evans, 1980; Robertson, 1981). Whereas initial studies implicated adrenaline (Smalley, 1965; Carlson, 1968a), octopamine was found to be more potent in inducing luminescence than any amine other than synephrine (Carlson, 19686). Octopamine, but not synephrine, was found in adult lantern segments (Ro...

Fireflies (Coleoptera: Lampyridae) emit various types of light that differ among species and populations of the same species. Their lights are assumed to be biological properties that play important ecological and evolutionary roles. Some species in the Lampyridae emit periodic luminescence, the patterns of which are characterized by species-specific intervals. In previous work, it was predicte...

Some people in different parts of Iran use burned mantles as a wound healing medicine. To perform surface area measurement, twenty rats were divided randomly into two groups of 10 animals each. The 1st group received topical burned radioactive lantern mantle powder at 1st-3rd day after making excision wounds. The 2nd group received non-radioactive lantern mantle powder. For histological study, ...

Cuticular nanostructures found in insects effectively manage light for light polarization, structural color, or optical index matching within an ultrathin natural scale. These nanostructures are mainly dedicated to manage incoming light and recently inspired many imaging and display applications. A bioluminescent organ, such as a firefly lantern, helps to out-couple light from the body in a hig...

The behavior of the mesopelagic fish Benthosema glaciale was studied at 60°N in mid-summer. We hypothesized that diel vertical migration (DVM) is constrained by short and dusk nights (surface illumination > 10−2 μmol m−2 s−1) individuals are active depth during long summer days. Submerged echosounders provided high-resolution data throughout water column. During day, a part population ascended ...

General methods for the construction of magic squares of any order have been searched for centuries. Several " standard strategies " have been found for this purpose, such as the " knight movement " , or the construction of bordered magic squares, which played an important role in the development of general methods. What we try to do here is to give a general and comprehensive approach to the c...

A knight‟s tour on a board is a sequence of knight moves that visits each square exactly once. A knight‟s tour on a square board is called magic knight‟s tour if the sum of the numbers in each row and column is the same (magic constant). Knight‟s tour in higher dimensions (n > 3) is a new topic in the age-old world of knight‟s tours. In this paper, it has been proved that there can‟t be magic k...

tion " of poverty. It is impossible, by waving a magic wand, to rehouse great numbers of people, and a Labour Government would find itself faced by the same practical difficulties that have hitherto hampered and, in great measure, must continue to hamper, both central and local administrations. Slum clearance is a costly process, and comparatively little can be done in that direction until home...

A magic square is an n × n array of distinct positive integers whose sum along any row, column, or main diagonal is the same number. We compute the number of such squares for n = 4, as a function of either the magic sum or an upper bound on the entries. The previous record for both functions was the n = 3 case. Our methods are based on inside-out polytopes, i.e., the combination of hyperplane a...