Zhou, X; Liu, XH; Yang, Yan; Lu, XP
To explore the effect of artificial pigments on silk
material coloring, 'No2 Red X' chemical dyestuff was used in the add-eat experiment of domestic
silkworm. The result showed that: there was little effect on silk coloring in 5 instar larvae fed
by pigments during the first 4d; while during the late period of 5 instar, added food pigments
were transferred to silk gland by blood lymphatic, combined with silk molecular at the state of
sorption, and formed natural red silk which was not easy to fade away. This result laid a
theoretical basis for the study of artificial production natural color silk. Many kinds of
Lepidoptera insects could create color cocoons, of the main function is protecting and disguising
themselves in host plants. The color of Green is made up of yellow pigment, carotene, green bible
element, bravery green grain, and so on PI. The materials in yellow cocoons created by wild
silkworms are mostly lutein([3]).In domestic silkworms, if the absorbed carotenoids combined with
silkworm cocoon partly, they will create cocoons with different colors according with the kinds
of carotenoides. Under natural light, there are many different color cocoons-white, yellow,
incarnadine, green cocoons and so on-varying in different kinds of domestic silkworm breeds. The
cocoon silk color of yellow-red system comes mainly from carotene and lutein consisting in
mulberry leaf. While the green ones are mainly made up of flavonoids pigment ([3, 4]) Since both
breed resources of natural color cocoon and production performance were limited, Tao ect added
many kinds of artificial pigments in forage on the basis of conventional breeding, which made
pigments in body modified and transferred partially after domestic silkworm taking forage.
Therefore, its coloring ability was changed. According to different add-eat pigments, they
created pink, orange, green and shallow blue cocoons([6]). Yi ect used red pigment forage
additives to feed domestic silkworms. With absorbed and transferred in domestic cocoons body, red
pigment combined with proteins in sericine, fibroin, pupa body, moth body, egg shell. Finally,
the aim of producing natural color cocoons by using artificial pigments was achieved ([6]). We
chose domestic silkworm (SuxiongxYingxiao) as experiment material, did add-eat experiment by
using 'No2 Red X' pigment, studied the effect of pigment on domestic silkworm physiology, and
explored the physical effect of artificial pigment on silk material coloring. The result would
promote the establishment of the foundation for the application of artificial production of
natural color cocoons.