Antimicrobial proteins and peptides play key roles in innate immunity and they had been observed from a wide variety of organisms in the last few years. The present study was undertaken to characterize antimicrobial peptides from the epidermal mucus of cat fishes collected from the Parangipettai coastal environment. Antimicrobial properties of the cat fishes were tested against ten pathogenic b...

The understudied Black-tailed toad agama, Phrynocephalus maculatus maculatus, (Anderson, 1872) belongs to the Agamidae family. Iranian specimens are rare in collections and are distributed in the central and south-eastern deserts of Iran. In this research, biological studies including food habits, morphology, behaviors and habitats of these species were performed from April to September, 2013. ...

sex-determining mechanism in Poeciliid fishes of the genus Xiphophorus ' F : been studied for more than forty years (BELLAMY 1928; GORDON 1927), yet many problems remain unsolved. In the southern platyfish, Xiphophorus maculatus, native to Mexico and adjacent parts of Central America, there are three types of females (XX, WX, WY) and two types of males (XY and YY) (GORDON 1947, 1954; KALLMAN 19...

Different non-specific immune parameters and their seasonal changes in spotted Catfish Arius maculates from Vellar estuary was investigated. It was undertaken for a year which included four main seasons of a year such as summer (April-June), Pre Monsoon (July-september), Monsoon (October-December) and Post Monsoon (JanuaryMarch). The Physico-chemical parameters (Temperature, pH, Salinity and Ra...

A systematic checklist of fish and shellfishes the Poonthura estuary, Kerala, India is provided including notes on their conservation status. This includes 66 finfish five shellfish, belonging to 17 orders, 35 families, 60 genera. Carangiformes richest order (11 species, eight genera, three families), representing 15.4% total diversity. Carangidae, most diverse family with nine representatives,...

X-cell epidermal lesions are described from a single specimen of the hardhead catfish Anus felis (Ariidae). The lesions exhibited a n unusual growth pattern but did not involve any visceral organs. Histologically, the lesions resembled those previously described for coldwater f~shes . This is the first report of X-cell lesions from Lake Pontchartrain, Louisiana, USA, and the hardhead catfish re...

Intra-specific morphological variation in the indigenous catfish Arius jella (Ariidae) was studied in five estuarine localities in Sri Lanka (Koggala lagoon, Walawe estuary, Garanduwa lagoon, Nilwala estuary and Chilaw lagoon) using morphometric analysis. Five morphometric characteristics describing the shape of the fish were significantly different among some of the locations. Significantly sh...

Industrial effluents, controversially, is one of the largest and major contributors of pollution in aquatic ecosystem and affects the aquatic organisms in general and fishes in particular. Several laboratory studies were conducted to evaluate the effects of both treated and untreated effluents on fish. The studies showed wide ranges of toxicity at organismal as well as at population levels. The...