The crustacean Hyperglycemic Hormone (cHH) is present in many decapods in different isoforms, whose specific biological functions are still poorly understood. Here we report on the first chemical synthesis of three distinct isoforms of the cHH of Astacus leptodactylus carried out by solid phase peptide synthesis coupled to native chemical ligation. The synthetic 72 amino acid long peptide amide...

Tyrosinases, which are widely distributed among animals, plants and fungi, are involved in many biologically essential functions, including pigmentation, sclerotization, primary immune response and host defence. In the present study, we present a structural and physicochemical characterization of two new tyrosinases from the crustaceans Palinurus elephas (European spiny lobster) and Astacus lep...

  White Spot Virus (WSV) is currently the most serious viral pathogen of shrimp worldwide it causes mortality up to 100% within 7-10 days in commercial shrimp farms. Infected Indian white shrimp Fenneropenaeus indicus samples were collected from Guatr shrimp site in Sistan and Baluchestan province in south of Iran and WSV infection was confirmed by Nested PCR. WSV was isolated from infected shr...

The copper containing oxygen carrier haemo­ cyanin is the predominant protein in the hemolymph of most molluscs, crustaceans and spiders. Despite its abundance and the detailed knowledge on physiological aspects, relatively little informa­ tion exists on haemocyanin synthesis and its regu­ lation [1-4], In analogy to haemoglobin, where the addition of haeme influences the haemoglobin production...