Chemical senses are crucial for all organisms to detect various environmental information. Different protein families, expressed in chemosensory organs, are involved in the detection of this information, such as odorant-binding proteins, olfactory and gustatory receptors, and ionotropic receptors. We recently reported an Expressed Sequence Tag (EST) approach on male antennae of the noctuid moth...

Drosophila littoralis is a latitudinally widespread European species of the Drosophila virilis group. The species has ample genetic variation in photoperiodism (adult diapause) and circadian rhythmicity (pupal eclosion rhythm), with adaptive latitudinal clines in both of them. The possible common genetic basis between the variability of photoperiodism and circadian rhythms was studied by a long...

Hymenocallis littoralis has allelochemical importance such as defensive compounds, insect repellents, attractants, and their role in ecological balance. Antioxidant activities of Hymenocallis littoralis bulb, anther, flower, stem, leaves and root methanolic extracts were evaluated using Ferric Reducing Antioxdiant Power (FRAP), 2,2-diphenyl-1-picrylhydrazyl (DPPH), total phenolic and flavonoid ...

Pathogen attack and the plant's response to this attack affect herbivore oviposition preference and larval performance. Introduction of major resistance genes against Phytophthora infestans (Rpi-genes), the cause of the devastating late blight disease, from wild Solanum species into potato changes the plant-pathogen interaction dynamics completely, but little is known about the effects on non-t...

Apoptosis was postulated as the main barrier to replication of the Autographa californica nuclear polyhedrosis virus (AcMNPV) in a Spodoptera littoralis SL2 cell line (N. Chejanovsky and E. Gershburg, Virology 209:519-525, 1995). Thus, we hypothesized that the viral apoptotic suppressor gene p35 is either poorly expressed or nonfunctional in AcMNPV-infected SL2 cells. These questions were addre...

We analyzed the thermal ecology and activity patterns of the lizard community from the Restinga of Jurubatiba, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. The broadest activity was that of Tropidurus torquatus, a sit-and-wait forager, while the active foraging teiid Cnemidophorus littoralis had the shortest activity. The nocturnal gekkonid Hemidactylus mabouia was found active during the day only during early morn...

The susceptibility of all nymphal and adult stages of the Acridid grasshopper H. littoralis to different inoculum levels of the insect pathogenic nematodes of the family Heterorahabitidae was recorded. The two tested nematode species were local isolates belong to Heterorhabditis indica (Poinar, Karunakar & David, 1992) (isolate EGB4) and Heterorhabditis bacteriophora (Poinar, 1979) (isolate EKB...

This study was conducted in the Chapada dos Guimarães National Park and in the Província Serrana of Mato Grosso state, from May 2003 to July 2005 and involved the use of chemical baits to attract male orchid bees. A total of 498 males were captured, of which 38 were Eulaema (Apeulaema) pseudocingulata Oliveira. Twenty-nine of these were collected in the national park and nine in the Província S...