Table 1.
The SPI domains in the silkworm.
Figure 1.
Distribution of SPI genes on silkworm chromosomes.
(A) The four Chromosomes with the most number of SPI genes. Many SPI genes are in tandem clusters. (B) An example of SPI genes clustered on chromosome 3. Four genes on nscaf2925 are distributed in a cluster within 50 kb and eight genes on nscaf2931 are distributed in a cluster within 100 kb. The arrowhead indicates the transcriptional orientation of genes.
Figure 2.
Domain organization of some SPIs in Kunitz_BPTI family in Bombyx mori.
Rectangular boxes in different colors (red, green and yellow) represent the serine protease domain. The rhombic box in blue represents the cysteine protease domain. Boxes in other shapes and colors represent the non-inhibitor domains. The sizes (length of amino acid residues) of domains are marked by the scale.
Figure 3.
Tissue expression profiles of silkworm SPI genes.
Gene expression levels are represented by red (higher expression) and blue (lower expression) boxes. The columns represent ten different tissue or organ samples: testis, ovary, head, integument, fat body, midgut, hemocyte, malpighian tubule, A/MSG (anterior/median silk gland) and PSG (posterior silk gland). The column name is composed as “sample name-labeling dye- experiment order”.
Figure 4.
Expression patterns of some silkworm SPI genes showing tissue-specificy in silkworm larvae on day 3 of the fifth instar.
Semi-quantitative RT-PCR amplification of total RNA with BmSPI-specific oligonucleotides. Te, testis; Ov, ovary; He, head; Fa, fat body; In, integument; Mi, midgut; Ha, haemocyte; Ma, Malpighian tubules; Si, silk gland. The silkworm cytoplasmic actin A3 gene (Bmactin3, GenBank accession No. U49854) was used as internal control, and denoted by Bmactin3.
Figure 5.
Expression profiles of SPI genes during different developmental stages.
Gene expression levels are represented by red (higher) and blue (lower) boxes. The columns represents twenty different sample time points: day 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 of the fifth instar, start of wandering, 12th, 24th, 36th, 48th, 60th, 72nd, 96th, 120th hour after wandering; day6, day7, day8, day9, day10 after wandering and adult. Word “mix” in the column name represents that the sample came from both gender; word “m” in the column name represents that the sample came from male silkworm; word “f” in the column name represents that the sample came from female silkworm.
Figure 6.
Hierarchical cluster analyses of SPI genes after microorganism infection.
Red represents that gene expression is up-regulated; black represents that gene expression is not changed; green represents that gene expression is download-regulated; gray represents data missing. Hierarchical clustering was performed using Cluster version 3.0 and visualized by TreeView.