Serpin is a broadly distributed superfamily of proteins that have a crucial role in regulating various immune reactions. Herein we identified a serpin-10 gene from Antheraea pernyi that encodes a 1557 amino acid residue protein with a predicted molecular weight of 58.76 kDa. Recombinant Apserpin-10 protein was expressed in a prokaryotic expression system (Escherichia coli) and the purified protein was used to prepare rabbit anti-Apserpin-10 polyclonal antibodies. Quantitative real-time polymerase chain reaction and western blot analysis indicate that Apserpin-10 was transcribed in all the tissues examined, including haemolymph, malpighian tubules, fat body, silk gland, integument and mid gut; the greatest expression level of Apserpin-10 was recorded in the fat body and haemocytes. The comparison of different developmental stages showed that Apserpin-10 transcript level was highest in 5th instar larvae, while the lowest expression was recorded at the egg stage. We also investigated the expression patterns of Apserpin-10 in fat body and haemocyte samples, following administration of heat-inactivated gram-positive bacteria (Micrococcus luteus), gram negative bacteria (Escherichia coli), a fungus (Beauveria bassiana) and virus (nuclear polyhedrosis virus, NPV). A substantial up-regulation of Apserpin-10 expression was recorded following pathogen challenge in both the tissues tested. Further the knock down of Apserpin-10 led to down regulation of antimicrobial peptide genes. Altogether, our results indicate that Apserpin-10 is involved in the innate immunity of A. pernyi., Saima Kausar, Cen Qian, Muhammad Nadeem Abbas, Bao-Jian Zhu, Ya Liu, Lei Wang, Guo-Qing Wei, Yu Sun, Chao-Liang Liu., and Obsahuje bibliografii
The complete mitochondrial genome (mitogenome) of Spilarctia robusta (Lepidoptera: Noctuoidea: Erebidae) was sequenced and analyzed. The circular mitogenome is made up of 15,447 base pairs (bp). It contains a set of 37 genes, with the gene complement and order similar to that of other lepidopterans. The 12 protein coding genes (PCGs) have a typical mitochondrial start codon (ATN codons), whereas cytochrome c oxidase subunit 1 (cox1) gene utilizes unusually the CAG codon as documented for other lepidopteran mitogenomes. Four of the 13 PCGs have incomplete termination codons, the cox1, nad4 and nad6 with a single T, but cox2 has TA. It comprises six major intergenic spacers, with the exception of the A+T-rich region, spanning at least 10 bp in the mitogenome. The nucleotide composition of the genome is greatly A+T biased (81.09%), with a negative AT skewness (-0.007), indicating the presence of fewer As than Ts, similar to other Noctuoidea. The A+T-rich region is 343 bp long, and contains some conserved regions, including an "ATAGA" motif followed by a 19 bp poly-T stretch, a microsatellite-like (AT)9 and a poly-A element, a characteristic shared with other lepidopteran mitogenomes. Phylogenetic analysis, based on 13 PCGs using Maximum likelihood methods revealed that S. robusta belongs to the superfamily Noctuoidea., Yu Sun, Sen Tian, Cen Qian, Yu-Xuan Sun, Muhammad N. Abbas, Saima Kausar, Lei Wang, Guoqing Wei, Bao-Jian Zhu, Chao-Liang Liu., and Obsahuje bibliografii