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. 2012;8(3):e1002591.
doi: 10.1371/journal.pgen.1002591. Epub 2012 Mar 8.

The silkworm coming of age--early

Affiliations

The silkworm coming of age--early

René Feyereisen et al. PLoS Genet. 2012.
No abstract available

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1. Development of the silkworm without juvenile hormones (JHs).
Maintenance of larval characters before the larval-pupal and pupal-adult molts is the classical status quo role of JH. This JH effect is carried out through its receptor Met and the transcription factor Kr-h1. The mod mutants studied by Daimon et al. lack a P450 enzyme (epoxidase) and cannot make functional JH, yet they do not enter metamorphosis until after two larval molts, producing precocious pupae instead of the normal fourth larval instar. This unexpected result suggests that the early larval instars might be insensitive to the lack of JH. Illustration: Martina Hajduskova.

References

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