The crustacean hyperglycemic hormone (CHH) peptide family includes four types of neuropeptide in decapod and isopod crustaceans, and the ion-transport peptide in orthopteran insects. To identify a new member of this family in Insecta, a PCR-based search for cDNAs encoding CHH-family peptides was carried out in the silkworm Bombyx mori. A cDNA, named BmCHHL (Bombyx mori CHH-like protein), with a...

-Different amylase enzymes were identified by analysis of digestive fluid and haemolymph in diapausing and nondiapausing strains of silkworm, Bombyx mori. The diapausing strain showed negligible digestive amylase activity at a pH range of 3-11, while the nondiapausing strain registered strikingly higher amylase activity at pH 9.2. Higher levels of undigested starch was found in the faecal matte...

Beyond the commonly known proteins built silk fibres—fibroin and sericin, there are almost 300 bioactive proteins in the silkworm haemolymph. The aim of this work was to present bioactive compounds obtained from the silk fibre and isolated from the body of this insect, which may be used in medical and pharmacological applications. The most important are bioactive proteins. However, the juvenile...

In the present study, we determined the draft genome sequence of the entomopathogenic bacterium Serratia liquefaciens FK01, which is highly virulent to the silkworm. The draft genome is ~5.28 Mb in size, and the G+C content is 55.8%.

Nosema bombycis is a destructive, obligate intracellular parasite of the Bombyx mori. In this study, a single-chain variable fragment (scFv) dependent technology is developed for the purpose of inhibiting parasite proliferation in insect cells. The scFv-G4, which we prepared from a mouse G4 monoclonal antibody, can target the N. bombycis spore wall protein 12 (NbSWP12). Indirect immunofluoresce...

A second-generation linkage map was constructed for the silkworm, Bombyx mori, focusing on mapping Bombyx sequences appearing in public nucleotide databases and bacterial artificial chromosome (BAC) contigs. A total of 874 BAC contigs containing 5067 clones (22% of the library) were constructed by PCR-based screening with sequence-tagged sites (STSs) derived from whole-genome shotgun (WGS) sequ...

Axon guidance molecule Slit is critical for the axon repulsion in neural tissues, which is evolutionarily conserved from planarians to humans. However, the function of Slit in the silkworm Bombyx mori was unknown. Here we showed that the structure of Bombyx mori Slit (BmSlit) was different from that in most other species in its C-terminal sequence. BmSlit was localized in the midline glial cell...

Laser Raman spectroscopy reveals extensive 13-pleated sheet structure in a silkmoth chorion. This structure characterizes both developing and mature chorion samples, a-helical structure is much less evident, but /]-turns appear to be abundant. In the immature chorion the sulfhyd~'ls are apparently found in diverse environments. The highly localized ffrosine residues appear to be strongly hydrog...

This review examines how the concepts and ideas of crystallization can be extended further and applied to the field of mesoscopic soft materials. It concerns the structural characteristics vs. the macroscopic performance, and the formation mechanism of crystal networks. Although this subject can be discussed in a broad sense across the area of mesoscopic soft materials, our main focus is on sup...