Abstract
FOR many years the investigators of metamorphosis in the Lepidoptera have maintained that the source of the moulting hormone is the brain rather than the corpora allata, which Wigglesworth1formerly considered to be the organs producing the secretion in the bug, Rhodnius. Recently, however, Wigglesworth2 has produced evidence which suggests that an area in the pars intercerebralis of the supraæphageal ganglion of Rhodnius is responsible for the production of the moulting hormone. As he points out, Hanström3 had already described modified nerve cells in this same region which are considered, on morphological grounds, to be probably secretory in function. Neurosecretory cells have been described in several other insects, but it has been reported that, in spite of careful search, no such cells could be found in the brain of the moth larvæ (Ephestia kuehniella) studied by Schrader4.
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References
Wigglesworth, V. B., Quart. J. Micr. Sci., 77, 191 (1934).
Wigglesworth, V. B., NATURE, 144, 753 (1939).
Hanstrom, B., Lunds Univ. Arsskrift, N.F., 34, No. 16 (1938).
Schrader, K., Biol. Zbl., 58, 52 (1938).
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DAY, M. Neurosecretory Cells in the Ganglia of Lepidoptera. Nature 145, 264 (1940). https://doi.org/10.1038/145264b0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/145264b0
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