Any of various caterpillars that produce silk cocoons, especially the larva of a moth (Bombyx mori) native to Asia that spins a cocoon of fine, strong, lustrous fiber that is the source of commercial silk.
silkworm
Dictionary:
silk·worm (sĭlk'wûrm')  |
| 5min Related Video: silkworm |
| Animal Encyclopedia: Silkworm |
Bombyx mori
FAMILY
Bombycidae
TAXONOMY
Phalaena mori Linnaeus, 1758, China.
OTHER COMMON NAMES
English: Silkmoth; French: Ver de la soie, bombyx du mûrier; German: Seidenspinner; Spanish: Gusano de seta; Finnish: Silkkiperhonen.
PHYSICAL CHARACTERISTICS
Caterpillars (1.5 in, or 4 cm) are pale brown, with brown marks on the thorax and a horn on the tail. They pupate in a white to yellow cocoon, the color depending on genetics and diet. The silk forming the cocoon is a single, continuous thread (1,000–3,000 ft, or 300–900 m, long) of a protein secreted from salivary glands. Adults are heavy, rounded, furry, and whitish with pale brown lines. The forewings have a hooked tip, and the wingspan is 1.5–2.5 in (4–6 cm).
DISTRIBUTION
Originally from the north of China, the north of India, Japan, Taiwan, and Korea. Now also bred in Europe and North and South America as a commodity in the textile market.
HABITAT
On mulberry worldwide.
BEHAVIOR
Adults cannot fly. Larvae are so domesticated now that they cannot survive without the assistance of humans.
FEEDING ECOLOGY AND DIET
Caterpillars feed on mulberry leaves; adults have atrophied mouthparts and do not feed.
REPRODUCTIVE BIOLOGY
The female lays 200–500 lemon-yellow eggs that turn black and hatch in spring. In four to six weeks, larvae undergo four molts and then spin a silk cocoon (in a process taking three or more days) to pupate. Adults emerge in three weeks, reproduce, and die within five days. Univoltine (having one generation per year) under natural conditions.
CONSERVATION STATUS
Bred in captivity for thousands of years; no wild colonies remain.
SIGNIFICANCE TO HUMANS
Used to make silk and for education and research. Originally domesticated in China. To harvest silk, cocoons are boiled in water to kill pupae and help unravel thread. Dead pupae sometimes are used as cockroach bait or fish food or to fertilize mulberry trees.
| Columbia Encyclopedia: silkworm |
silkworm, name for the larva of various species of moths, indigenous to Asia and Africa but now domesticated and raised for silk production throughout most of the temperate zone. The culture of silkworms is called sericulture. The various species of silkworms raised today are distinguished by the quality of the silk they produce, the type of leaves on which they feed, and the number of breedings per year. The most widely raised type and the producer of the finest silk is the larva of Bombyx mori, of Asian origin. After centuries of domestication, Bombyx mori is no longer found anywhere in a natural state. The legs of the larvae have degenerated, and the adults do not fly. Hatched from eggs so small that about 35,000 of them weigh only an ounce, these silkworms are immediately quite active and feed voraciously on mulberry leaves. At the end of the larval stage (32 to 38 days after hatching) they are about 3 in. (7.5 cm) long. A mature larva attaches itself to a twig and, with a weaving motion of its head and a slow, circular motion of its body, begins to spin its cocoon (see pupa). A moist substance, fibroin, is manufactured in two silk glands located on the underside of the larva's body; mixed with a small amount of wax, it is emitted from an orifice called the spinneret, in the lip of the larva. The fibroin dries quickly in the air, hardening into a half-mile-long thread of silk that makes up the cocoon. The adult moth, with a wingspread of 1.75 in. (4.5 cm), emerges from the cocoon in about two weeks. The moths mate and lay their eggs (several hundred from each female) within a week; the eggs hatch in about ten days. Only enough cocoons to ensure adequate reproduction are allowed to hatch; the rest are unwound after developing for a week, and the silk is processed. The giant silkworms used in some Asian and South American sericulture are the larvae of the closely related saturnid moths (family Saturniidae). They include the tussah moth (Antherala pernyi), the producer of tussah silk. The ailanthus moth (Samia walkeri), a large, olive-green saturnid moth used in China to produce a coarse grade of silk, was imported to the United States along with its food plant, the Chinese ailanthus tree, as the basis of an industry that never materialized; the moth has been firmly established in the New York City area since 1861. Diseases of silkworms have occasioned important scientific work. When Pasteur saved the French silk industry from destruction by pébrine, a protozoan disease of insects, in the mid-18th cent., he also made an important contribution to the germ theory of disease. The common silkworm, Bombyx mori, is classified in the phylum Arthropoda, class Insecta, order Lepidoptera, family Bombycidae.
| WordNet: silkworm |
Note: click on a word meaning below to see its connections and related words.
The noun has 2 meanings:
Meaning #1:
hairless white caterpillar of the Chinese silkworm moth; source of most commercial silk
Meaning #2:
larva of a saturniid moth; spins a large amount of strong silk in constructing its cocoon
Synonyms: giant silkworm, wild wilkworm
| Translations: Silkworm |
Français (French)
n. - ver à soie
Deutsch (German)
n. - (Zool.) Seidenraupe
Ελληνική (Greek)
n. - μεταξοσκώληκας
Italiano (Italian)
baco da seta
Português (Portuguese)
n. - bicho-da-seda (m)
Русский (Russian)
тутовый шелкопряд
Español (Spanish)
n. - gusano de seda
Svenska (Swedish)
n. - silkesmask
中文（简体）(Chinese (Simplified))
蚕
中文（繁體）(Chinese (Traditional))
n. - 蠶
العربيه (Arabic)
(الاسم) دودة ألقز, دودة ألحرير
עברית (Hebrew)
n. - תולעת-המשי
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 | bombyx |
| Bombyx mori (invertebrate zoology) |
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 | Dictionary. The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition Copyright © 2007, 2000 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Updated in 2007. Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved. Read more |
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| Animal Encyclopedia. Grzimek's Animal Life Encyclopedia. Copyright © 2005 by The Gale Group, Inc. All rights reserved. Read more |
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| Columbia Encyclopedia. The Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition Copyright © 2003, Columbia University Press. Licensed from Columbia University Press. All rights reserved. www.cc.columbia.edu/cu/cup/ Read more |
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| WordNet. WordNet 1.7.1 Copyright © 2001 by Princeton University. All rights reserved. Read more |
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| Translations. Copyright © 2007, WizCom Technologies Ltd. All rights reserved. Read more |
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Mentioned in
- bombyx
- Bombyx mori (invertebrate zoology)
- bombic
- white muscardine (invertebrate zoology)
- bombykol (biology)
- silkworm moth
- silk
- pebrine
- bombazine
- Limeira (city of southeast Brazil)
- HY-4
- bombycid
- polyphemus moth
- bombycinous
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