STUDIES ON THE EFFECT OF POLYAMINES ON GROWTH AND SILK PRODUCTION IN TASAR SILKWORM Antheraea mylitta. D, DABA BV ECORACE

Tasar silkworm, Antheraea mylitta is a silk-producing wild Lepidopteran, grows in wild conditions, and is reared by forest tribal communities in South and Eastern Indian states. Raw and fabricated silk is used in many industries to prepare sophisticated goods and also achieve foreign exchange value. Rearing in an open environment reduces crop yield due to unfavourable abiotic stress and biotic invaders. Polyamines (PAs) are intermediate metabolites formed during amino acids metabolism and participate in vital cellular functions and their deficiency led to an adverse impact on cellular metabolisms. PAs supplements showed different outcomes in Bombyx mori. But various polyamines i.e., Putrescine (Put), Spermidine (Spd), and Spermine (Spm) application with different concentrations (50 µM, 100 µM, and 150 µM) and comparative study at natural conditions in Tasar silkworm, A. mylitta, DABA-BV ecorace was not yet done to date. This study reveals that PAs of Spd 50, spd 100, Spm 50, and Spm 100 were raised Larval and silk gland weight, Silk gland body mass Index (BMI), the weight of cocoon pupa, shell along with the filament length and reliability percentage. These results can be used to develop hybrid ecoraces of silkworms that can effectively metabolize amino acids and their derivative polyamines.