Just commenting on the first reference to “tungstate injections”
As someone who wrote their thesis on the topic of wing development signaling, tungstate is mainly effective for nymphalids and certain groups of butterflies. It’s less toxic than other compounds and easily accessible. This makes it a good and easy option for producing aberrations.
There are in reality numerous compounds that induce aberrations through different mechanisms. Some of them mimic stress responses that result in darker wings. It’s a common immune response in insects to produce melanin.
There are also variable patterns that can be induced depending on the stage of injection.
I have been working with a new compound that can actually lighten the wings instead of darken them.
Given that my work is still to be published I don’t want to reveal too much. I also do have a concern regarding individuals using my work to sell man made aberrations but I believe it’s more important to have knowledge freely accessible.
I should also note that unlike tungstate where the mechanism of action (how it works) is unknown, a lot of other compounds we know exactly how they act. The main difference between compounds is their toxicity, the cost, and the difficulty in acquiring the compounds (must have scientific institutional purchase accounts).
Below is an artificial aberration from my research a while back plus link to other pictures.
[media]
https://x.com/edtomologist/status/17270 ... UjOYW-YQdw[/media]
