MicroRNAs (miRNAs) have emerged as key players in host-pathogen interaction. Recently, many virus-encoded miRNAs have been identified from different mammalian species. However, the large family of invertebrate viruses of Baculoviridae, which infects diverse species of beneficial insects and agriculture pests, has hardly been investigated for elucidating the role of miRNAs in host-pathogen inter...

The domesticated silkworm, Bombyx mori serves as an ideal representative of lepidopteran species for a variety of scientific studies. As a result, databases have been created to organize information pertaining to the silkworm genome that is subject to constant updating. Of these, four main databases are important for store nucleotide information in the form of genomic data, ESTs and microsateli...

A mutant of Bombyx mori has wings with few scales and is named scaleless. We investigated the morphology of this mutant and found that it had many fewer wing scales than the corresponding wild type (WT) silkworm and that the remaining scales were smaller in shape with fewer furcations. Reciprocal transplantation of wing discs between scaleless and WT revealed that the WT wing disc could develop...

RNA interference (RNAi) is an evolutionarily conserved mechanism for sequence-specific gene silencing. Previously, the BmN4-SID1 cell expressing Caenorhabditis ele gans SID-1 was established, in which soaking RNAi could induce effective gene silencing. To establish its utility, 6 cell cycle progression related cDNAs, CDK1, MYC, MYB, RNRS, CDT1, and GEMININ, were isolated from the silkworm, Bomb...

We analyzed the presence of chemical compounds from the head space of Bombyx mori which are attracted / recognized and entrapped by the head proteins upon biting of mulberry leaves through Gas Chromatography-Mass Spectrometry (GC-MS) analysis. The results of GC-MS showed that 28 chemical compounds were present in the head space of B. mori. Among this 28 compounds phenol, 2, 4-bis(1,1dimethyleth...

Bombyx mori L. (Lepidoptera: Bombycidae) nucleopolyhedrovirus (BmNPV) is a highly pathogenic virus in the sericultural industry, often causing severe damage leading to large economic losses. The immune mechanisms of B. mori against this virus remain obscure. Previous studies had demonstrated Bmlipase-1, BmNox and Bmserine protease-2 showing antiviral activity in vitro, but data on the transcrip...

The aldo-keto reductase AKR2E4 reduces 3-dehydroecdysone to ecdysone in the silkworm Bombyx mori L. In this study, a quantitative polymerase chain reaction analysis revealed that the level of AKR2E4 mRNA was higher in the testes than in other tissues, and a western immunoblot analysis revealed that the AKR2E4 content in the testes was stage-specific from the fifth larval instar to the pupal sta...

MicroRNAs (miRNAs) constitute some of the most significant regulatory factors involved at the post-transcriptional level after gene expression, contributing to the modulation of a large number of physiological processes such as development, metabolism, and disease occurrence. This review comprehensively and retrospectively explores the literature investigating silkworm, Bombyx mori L. (Lepidopt...

Conformation-sensitive gel electrophoresis is a useful method for identifying allele polymorphism; it provides co-dominant molecular markers. Using this method, we identified genetic variability in the third intron of the fibroin light chain gene, fib-L, in six Bombyx mori strains. Only Chinese C21A strain did not demonstrate allelic alterations, showing only homoduplex DNA molecules. We found ...