A SEM study of unexplored wax microtubes produced by caterpillar living on common banana leaves.

The primary concern of this research is to perform a microscopic analysis of the natural wax covering banana skipper caterpillar. The scanning electron microscopic (SEM) analysis shows that the wax exhibits an unprecedented microtubular form, consisting of carbon and oxygen as main elements as revealed by energy dispersive X-ray (EDX) analysis. The Fourier Transform Infra-Red (FTIR) spectroscopic analysis, which reveals the presence of peaks at 2914, 2890, 1469, and 722 cm-1 and the absence of peaks around 1700 cm-1, indicates that the analyzed natural wax is a polyethylene wax without the CO functional group.