Observations on the effects of carotene on the growth and pigmentation of locusts

Abstract

A method of obtaining locust eggs which could be expected to be deficient in carotene is described. It involved rearing a parental generation on an artificial diet which, because of certain pigmentation abnormalities it induced, was probably itself deficient in carotene.Using crowded hatchlings ofLocusta migratoria(L.) from eggs thus modified, it was shown that they were sensitive to dietary carotene, whereas hatchlings from normal eggs were indifferent. The absence of carotene was marked by inferior growth, lessened activity and most notably by an extremely different coloration in both hoppers and adults. Without carotene, melanisation was absent or greatly reduced and in many cases the integument developed a greenish-blue colour. With carotene, heavy melanisation occurred in the hoppers, and the colour of the adults was characteristically gregarious.It was concluded that in normal eggs the amount of carotene present is usually sufficient to mask the expression of a dietary deficiency during nymphal growth, but that with normal eggs having low amounts of carotene, a dietary deficiency might become apparent as it did with modified eggs.It is suggested that the blue colour of modifiedLocustahoppers reared without carotene is due to mesobiliverdin, a prochromogen of insectoverdin, the green pigment of thesolitariaphase of locusts. Insectoverdin itself could not be formed because it contains carotenoids, and these were absent from the diet. The effect of extreme deprivation of carotene is therefore to induce solitaroid tendencies, notably in regard to colour (suppression of melanin and production of mesobiliverdin) but also in regard to activity.Crowded hoppers ofSchistocerca gregaria(Forsk.) reared on synthetic diets lacking carotene usually had turquoise-blue blood by the fifth instar. It was shown, by the electrophoresis of yellow, green and blue bloods in parallel, that the blue chromoprotein of blue blood is the same as the blue chromoprotein of green blood. Its prosthetic pigment must therefore be mesobiliverdin.The abnormalities of coloration which arise in crowdedLocustaandSchistocercawhen deprived of carotene are normal in the solitary phase. Moreover, they resemble those abnormalities of coloration consequent upon the implantation of additional corpora allata into gregarious hoppers. The implications of this are discussed in relation to the validity of phase criteria, and an attempt is made to relate these findings to hypotheses on the humoral regulation of phase.