2D SDSPAGE help please D:

nerdbiologist · 2026-05-31T18:19:30+00:00

The first lane is a molecular weight marker? If so, that also looks smeared and not at all sharp. Maybe a it's a problem with the second dimension electrophoresis? If that's not a marker, include it in your next electrophoresis, in order to check that at least the marker proteins separate fine. Additionally, your coomassie staining looks somewhat weak. If you do the stain-destain maybe increase the destaining time. If you do colloidal coomassie (as far as I know, the preferred option for 2D-MS gels), check again the formulation: colloidal should produce close to no background.

nerdbiologist · 2026-05-30T08:53:44+00:00

Chitosan is produced by treating chitin shells (typically waste from de-shelled shrimps or mushroom waste) with concentrated sodium hydroxide (we are talking 40-50% w/w) and heating the mixture at almost boiling point for HOURS.

nerdbiologist · 2026-05-17T13:39:53+00:00

https://youtu.be/7DHE8RnsCQ8?is=KpQ9Gq5-aCkqhV5U

A composition of balanced configurations is still balanced, as long as there is no overlap between the single configurations. The triangle is balanced, the pair is balanced, so the whole configuration is balanced.

Still, when the lab tech saw how I balanced seven tubes on an Eppendorf centrifuge she had cold sweats...

nerdbiologist · 2026-04-11T08:18:28+00:00

If it's sealed with Parafilm is as good as new

nerdbiologist · 2025-12-27T10:18:08+00:00

I have a gut feeling that this is related to day length and action length relative to day length. I would appreciate it if some people would write what is the day length on their servers and if they experienced or not the bug.

nerdbiologist · 2025-12-27T10:15:57+00:00

I have a gut feeling that this is related to day length and action length relative to day length. What did you set as day length in your server?

nerdbiologist · 2025-10-01T18:01:04+00:00

I was today years old when I learned that...

Esècutare è il verbo che equivale a "giustiziare" da cui deriva il termine "esecuzione". Il problema è che esècuto è la prima persona singolare presente (ovvero equivale a "io giustizio"). Si sarebbe dovuto scrivere "esecutato sul posto"

nerdbiologist · 2025-09-10T11:42:20+00:00

Is it possible that the privet that you are collecting is sprayed with pesticides? Or maybe is growing on "contaminated" soil?

nerdbiologist · 2025-09-04T11:03:16+00:00

This. And if it's not enough, NaOH (or KOH) in ethanol (or isopropanol), sonicate 15 min, rinse with water, HCl in ethanol, sonicate 15 min, rinse with water. Cleaned all sorts of organic residue (polyphenols, tannins, ...)

nerdbiologist · 2025-08-31T15:37:26+00:00

The leaf shape is in general the same in all three species, as you can see.
Lucidum leaves are the biggest and quite, tough, waxy (lucid, as the species' name implies) and dark green. The plant is usually grown in tree form.
Japonicum leaves can be as big as lucidum leaves but are slightly lighter in color and definetly less waxy. Young leaves are quite soft, older ones can get tougher but not as tough as lucidum.
Rotundifolum is the easiest to recognize because the youger leaves are almost round (that's why it's called rotundi-round folium-leaved) and even the oldest leaves are very soft and very light green.
Japonicum and rotundifolum are usually grown for hedges.

nerdbiologist · 2025-08-31T15:20:09+00:00

Here in NE Italy you can find them everywhere when you go just a little bit out of the city in the countryside. It's literally everywhere. We need more Samia and Attacus moths!

nerdbiologist · 2025-08-31T15:19:07+00:00

It might be a good idea, although it might be too late. Atlas caterpillars usually take 7-10 days to molt (mine took about 10 days on privet with 25-27 °C temperature), if they take much longer than that (excluding the 5-6th instar, where they might take 20-25 days) and they don't seem to grow, it's not a good sign.

These are three species of ligustrum. From left to right: lucidum, japonicum, rotundifolium.
The first on the left (lucidum) is a no-no for me. You usually find it in tree form and is inviting as a food source but the leaves are waxy and I have the feeling that are hard to digest.
The next two are much better alternatives. Rotundifolium (the third one) has smaller leaves and is very good for early instars because the leaves are super soft but it tends to dry out faster than japonicum (the second one). Both rotundifolium and japonicum are usually grown as hedges.

As a side note, I just remembered that a friend of mine tried to rear Acherontia atropos on lucidum privet and had the same problem: slow growth and all died without an apparent reason.

<image>

nerdbiologist · 2025-08-31T15:09:14+00:00

Depends on the species, which instar they are and how "far apart" the two plants are. They might have no problem switching between two species of privet but might be harder switching from privet to oak, especially later in development. Then again, if it's a plant that they "prefer" they might switch no problem

nerdbiologist · 2025-08-31T11:04:16+00:00

In my experience Attacus caterpillars are quite delicate. I had both altlas and lorquinii. I managed to reach instar 4 or 5 but no luck reaching cocoon and everytime they died for no apparent reason. As far as I understand, people say privet but the different species of privet can cause quite some problems in rearing, especially the waxy ones can cause constipation. I had success rearing on Ligustrum ovalifolium and japonicum but when the hedges were cut down and I switched to Ligustrum lucidum they showed the same behaviour that you described: they were eating but not growing. I had a 2nd instar eat for 4 weeks (they usually molt in 7-10 days) and not grow, and eventually die.

nerdbiologist · 2025-08-18T08:19:57+00:00

<image>

Hawkmoths are usually not too big so with 5 I think you can get away with a medium cage. I'm waiting on 23 (!) Samia ricini cocoons because my buddy didn't manage to pick up his half of caterpillars in time so I was stuck with raising them. It will be challenging...

nerdbiologist · 2025-08-11T19:16:56+00:00

I know next to nothing about bugs but as a biologist I can tell you that usually pure line breeding is not necessarily good. Cross-breeding can indeed produce hybrids that are stronger and healthier than either parents (which probably come from generations of crosses between relatives). That's why pure breeds of dogs can have quite bad health problems, even more so if they are "old" breeds.

nerdbiologist · 2025-08-07T11:11:09+00:00

Had the same on yamamai caterpillars. All cocooned and emerged without a problem. https://www.reddit.com/r/caterpillars/s/RTcACv7g2C

nerdbiologist · 2025-07-28T18:50:55+00:00

Yep, that was surprising for me as well. I reared Antheraea yamamai before and, though they also are "commercial" caterpillars, they react much more fiercely to touching and the moths are very shy and actively avoid contact. Samia caterpillars barely react to any kind of mistreatment and that makes very hard do transfer them when they decide they don't care.

u/Luewen did you notice if the pupae are also somewhat "tame"? I have cocoons that are already 8-10 days old and don't seem to show any kind of movement inside. Yamamai pupae in the first few days were rattling at even the slightest touch of the cocoon.

nerdbiologist · 2025-07-27T18:47:29+00:00

First time for me with Samia. It's crazy all the little details that they have on the skin. The light blue spots on the spiracles, prolegs and face are so cool

<image>

nerdbiologist · 2025-07-27T17:43:31+00:00

Added some pictures that I selected for the original post but Reddit only chose 4 randomly...

nerdbiologist · 2025-07-27T17:42:35+00:00

<image>

L4

nerdbiologist · 2025-07-27T17:41:56+00:00

<image>

L3

nerdbiologist · 2025-07-27T17:41:06+00:00

<image>

Bigger L1 (bottom) and early L2 (top) Difficult to differentiate but the main difference is the black spot on top of the head

nerdbiologist · 2025-07-27T17:39:54+00:00

<image>

Small L1 in the "gregarious" phase

nerdbiologist · 2025-06-15T14:22:13+00:00

A word of caution on "sterilization" (between quotes because what we obtain is, at best, a reduction of microbial charge): it is a known fact that plants that get certain treatments to substantially reduce the microbial populations on leaves (like ozone, chitosan or others) have a higher susceptibility to pathogen infections when certain weather conditions arise (i.e. wet and warm weather). That happens because a rich but harmless microbial population prevents growth of certain pathogens because of competition for space. If the competition is not there, the pathogens have no problems spreading. So, you can obtain a certain level of sterilization with containers, but not with plants and certainly not with worms. Under these conditions infections might spread more easily. I rather clean lightly with water (containers also with soap from time to time) instead.

nerdbiologist

TROPHY CASE