Proteomic analysis and characterization of silk proteins in silkworm (Bombyx mori l.)

Of the various insect species silk producing  insects  which includes Bombyx mori and Antherae mylitta are very famous as these are highly beneficial to the mankind. They produce silk which is worldwide recognized as the Queen of fibres. The demand of silk is increasing in the world day by day and therefore many scientists are involved to increase the production and productivity of silk by using latest technologies. . Natural fibres have an edge over artificial fibres and silk excels all the fibres for a number of inherent characteristics such as lusture, softness, elegance, versatility, wearability, yarn strength etc. Silk fibre is constituted by two important proteins, fibroin (73.5 %) and sericin (22.28 %).These proteins are the complex organic nitrogenous substances. Proteins occupy a central position in the architecture as well as functioning of living matter. Proteomics is a newly emerging field of life science research, using high throughput technologies to display, identify or characterize all the proteins in a given cell, tissue or organism. Three approaches are mainly used in proteomics viz., Gel-based proteomics, mass spectrometry driven proteomics and protein arrays. Gel based proteomics is the older approach to screen the protein expression at large scale and it includes (IFF) First dimensional isoelectric focursing (Bravo et al., 1981) and Second dimensional SDS-PAGE (Gorg et al., 1988) . The present paper overviews some important studies carried out on silk proteins viz. sericin and fibroin of silkworm, Bombyx mori L.