| Budget Amount *help |
¥17,420,000 (Direct Cost: ¥13,400,000、Indirect Cost: ¥4,020,000)
Fiscal Year 2020: ¥3,770,000 (Direct Cost: ¥2,900,000、Indirect Cost: ¥870,000)
Fiscal Year 2019: ¥3,380,000 (Direct Cost: ¥2,600,000、Indirect Cost: ¥780,000)
Fiscal Year 2018: ¥5,070,000 (Direct Cost: ¥3,900,000、Indirect Cost: ¥1,170,000)
Fiscal Year 2017: ¥5,200,000 (Direct Cost: ¥4,000,000、Indirect Cost: ¥1,200,000)
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| Outline of Final Research Achievements |
A Japanese colubrid snake, Rhabdophis tigrinus, sequesters toxins from toads consumed as prey and stores them in the nuchal glands, which are embedded under the skin of the neck region, for the defensive use. Several congeneric species in China do not eat anurans and instead feed earthworms as main diet. We have revealed that these species also possess toxins similar to those of toads, but they sequester the toxins from fireflies, not toads. This implies that the evolution from toad-toxin utilization to firefly-toxin utilization has occurred in the ancestral species of Rhabdophis in China. In addition, we showed the morphological variation of the nuchal glands among species and clarified the diversity of the nuchal gland system in Rhabdophis.
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