Artificial Food for Eri-silkworm Raising

Authors succeeded in rearing eri-silkworms from hatching to the mouth stage on an artificial food. The artificial food devised were composed of powdered leaves of castor-oil plant, “Kinako” (a powder of parched soy bean), sucrose, agar-agar, inhibitor solution and water. The results on larval raising, cocoon fibres and eggs of the eri-silkworms reared on artificial food were the same as those in the case of the eri-silkworms reared on fresh leaves of castor-oil plant, natural food for this insect, or rather better. The raising of eri-silkworms on artificial food may be adopted industrially for production of a wild silk.     

丽龟的人工饲养初报

本文报道了2001年10月至2004年4月间,2只丽龟在人工饲养条件下的观察和试验结果.     

A Semi-Synthetic Diet for Eri-Silkworm Raising

Hatchlings of the eri-silkworm (Philosamia cynthia ricini), one of the leaf-feeding insects, may be reared to the adult stage on an artificial diet, named as a semi-synthetic diet, which does not contain any extracts from leaves of food plants such as Ricinus communis, Aylanthus glandulosa etc., not to mention the powder of dry leaves of these plants. The composition of the present semi-synthetic diet was ‘kinako’ (a powder of parched soy bean), sucrose, dry brewer yeast, β-sitosterol, l-ascorbic acid, agar-agar, sodium dehydroacetate as an aseptic and water. Though the present semi-synthetic diet leaves room for improvement, at any rate the diet enabled 48 out of 100 hatchlings to spin their cocoons. Therefore the present (or improved) semi-synthetic diet has opened a way to make possible to rear eri-silkworms all the season with the omission of the cultivation of food plants, such as Ricinus communis, etc. In developing this diet ascorbic acid was shown to be essential for eri-silkworms, and it was also found that sucrose stimulated feeding by this insect in addition to its metabolic importance.     

Raising the bar for systematic conservation planning

Systematic conservation planning (SCP) represents a significant step toward cost-effective, transparent allocation of resources for biodiversity conservation. However, research demonstrates important consequences of uncertainties in SCP and of basing methods on simplified circumstances involving few real-world complexities. Current research often relies on single case studies with unknown forms and amounts of uncertainty as well as low statistical power for generalizing results. Consequently, conservation managers have little evidence for the true performance of conservation planning methods in their own complex, uncertain applications. To build effective and reliable methods in SCP, there is a need for more challenging and integrated testing of their robustness to uncertainty and complexity, and much greater emphasis on generalization to real-world situations.     

人工食物对高原鼠兔稳定性碳和氮同位素组成的影响

以玉米面、小米面和绿豆粉 (质量比为 5∶3∶2 )的混合食物饲喂青藏高原地区特有种高原鼠兔 ,4 0d后断头杀死 ,取其后腿肌肉测定稳定性碳和氮同位素组成。结果表明 ,用混合食物饲喂后 ,高原鼠兔的稳定性碳同位素比值显著升高 ,由对照的 (- 2 4 6 6± 0 2 5 )‰上升为 (- 19 0 5± 0 0 9)‰ ;稳定性氮同位素的组成变化较小 ,仅由对照的 (3 2 8± 0 13)‰增加为饲喂后的 (3 6 1± 0 32 )‰。经人工食物饲喂后 ,高原鼠兔与其食物间稳定性碳同位素的分馏效应为 4 73‰ ,稳定性氮同位素的分馏效应为 2 79‰。C4组分食物的加入影响高原鼠兔的稳定性同位素 (特别是氮同位素 )代谢模式 ,其稳定性同位素代谢周转率可能高于原来预测的 4 0d。     

Artificial substrates for prenyltransferase

Four out of 16 new allylic pyrophosphates synthesized were found to be artificial substrates for liver prenyltransferase (EC 2.5.1.1). These were the trans-and the cis-3-ethyl-3-methylallyl, the 3,3-diethylallyl and the (mixture of cis and trans) 3-methyl-3-n-propylallyl pyrophosphates. The products synthesized from these substrates and isopentenyl pyrophosphate were the appropriate homo- and bishomo-farnesyl pyrophosphates. Substitution of 3,3-dimethylallyl pyrophosphate at C-2 with a methyl group destroyed its reactivity with the enzyme. Neither the unsubstituted allyl pyrophosphate nor the cis- or trans-3-methylallyl pyrophosphate could be condensed with isopentenyl pyrophosphate. Thus the simplest allylic substrate for prenyltransferase is 3,3-dimethylallyl pyrophosphate.