Development of sericin rich bivoltine silkworm breed/hybrid of Bombyx mori L.

摘要

In India, sericin was hitherto considered as an undesirable waste product in the textile industry. Of late, it is emerging as a viable product of commercial value. In view of its importance, the present work was undertaken to develop a sericin rich breed/hybrid. In the present study, the bivoltine breed characterized by naked pupa 'Nd' identified from germplasm maintained at Central Sericulrural Research and Training Institute, Mysore was crossed with the popular bivoltine breed, CSR2. Selection of sericin rich cocoons coupled with sib mating was followed in every generation to get higher sericin content. The resultant breed named as 'N' produces cocoons with high sericin content (98%). Sixteen hybrid combinations including reciprocals were prepared by utilizing the sericin rich breed 'N', along with eight bivoltine breeds viz., CSR2, CSR3, CSR6, CSR26, CSR27, CSR50, CSR51 and NB4D2. The hybrids were evaluated based on seven quantitative traits and the hybrid 'N x CSR26' was selected. The hybrid, N x CSR26 is characterized by survival of 96.6%, cocoon weight of 2.073 g, shell weight of 0.096 g, shell percentage of 4.62 and high sericin content of cocoon (98.5%).