(A) Effects at transcript level; N6 females received two 3-µg doses of dsMet-a, one on N6D0 and the other on N6D3, and Met mRNA levels were measured on N6D6; controls received an equivalent treatment with dsMock. (B) Dorsal and ventral view of specimens resulting from dsMet-a treatment in N6; normal adult obtained from dsMock treatments; mild and severe adult phenotypes obtained after Adult N6 with adultoid features, mild and severe, obtained from dsMet-a treatments. (C) Tegmina and membranous wings corresponding to normal adult obtained after dsMock treatments, and to adults treated with dsMet-a showing the mild and the severe phenotype. (D) Effects of Met depletion on N6 on the expression of EcR, RXR, E75A and ILP-1 measured on N6D6. In A and D, each point represents 4 biological replicates and results are expressed as the mean ± SEM; data are normalized against the dsMock-treated samples (reference value = 1), and the asterisk indicates statistically significant differences with respect to controls (p<0.05), according to the REST software tool [29]. Photomicrographs in B–C were with a Zeiss DiscoveryV8 Stereo microscope with an AxioCam MRc digital camera; scale bars = 3 mm.