Protease activities in the haemolymph and fat body in a bloodsucking insect, Rhodnius prolixus, infected with Trypanosoma rangeli, were investigated. After SDS-polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis containing gelatin as substrate, analysis of zymograms performed on samples of different tissues of controls and insects inoculated or orally infected with short or long epimastigotes of T. rangeli, dem...

Lectins play important role in innate immunity of animals. The affinity of the natural haemagglutinin of the giant freshwater prawn Macrobrachium rosenbergii towards vertebrate erythrocytes and its level with relation to sex, size and moult stages were studied. The strongest agglutinating titres in haemolymph of prawns were marked against guinea pig, chicken, Clarias batrachus, and rabbit eryth...

The hive of the honey bee is a suitable habitat for diverse mites (Acari), including nonparasitic, omnivorous, and pollen-feeding species, and parasites. The biology and damage of the three main pest species Acarapis woodi, Varroa jacobsoni, and Tropilaelaps clareae is reviewed, along with detection and control methods. The hypothesis that Acarapis woodi is a recently evolved species is rejecte...

bee stings are commonly encountered worldwide. various manifestations after bee sting have been described including local reactions which are common, systemic responses such as anaphylaxis, diffuse intravascular coagulation and hemolysis. we report a case of a 74-year-old man who developed neurologic deficit 5 hours after bee stings, which was confirmed to be left frontal infarction on brain ct...

        Freshwater crayfish (Astacus leptodactylus) is an important economic fisheries resource of Aras reservoir, Iran. The infection of freshwater crayfish by gram negative and gram positive bacteria are common in natural and cultural environments. These bacteria are considered as secondary disease agents or opportunities. This study was conducted to investigate infes...

Flower pollen is collected by honeybee foragers, adhered on their rear legs and transported into the hives in the form of pellets. Once in the hives, bee pollen is moisturised with nectar and bee mouth secretions and due to enzymatically modifications it becomes the so-called bee-bread, the protein reservoir of young bees. Bee pollen can be artificially removed from bee legs and collected by us...

a bivoltine silkworm hybrid, ka x nb4d2 was treated with the juvenoid r394 (ethyl-9 cyclohexyl-3,7-dimethyl-2,4-nonadienoate) at a dose of 0.039 nl/larva at 24, 48, 72 and 96 h of 5th instar for silk yield improvement. treatment specific significant increase was observed in the cocoon and shell weight with no such marked variation in the shell percentage. notable changes were also seen in trait...

1. When the parasitic mite Varroa jumped species from the eastern to the western honey bee, millions of infested bee colonies died. Recent work has revealed that the probable cause of this collapse is that mites provide a new route of transmission, by acting as a vector, for certain bee viruses. 2. Using a mathematical model parameterized by recently collected data on bee viruses, we investigat...

The systemic immune response of Drosophila is known to be induced both by septic injury and by oral infection with certain bacteria, and is characterized by the secretion of antimicrobial peptides (AMPs) into the haemolymph. To investigate other possible routes of bacterial infection, we deposited Erwinia carotovora (Ecc15) on various sites of the cuticle and monitored the immune response via e...

Insects have a slowly operating excretory system in which the passive rate of movement of haemolymph solutes into a slowly secreted primary excretory fluid is restricted by a reduction in the area available for passive transfer. They may have come to possess such an energy-saving system as a result of their evolution as small animals in osmotically and ionically stressful environments. Although...