Our previous work on the nightcrawler has been extended to include the North Carolina red worm, which is more suitable for breeding in the laboratory. We have developed methods for recovering, storing, and eventually allowing the eggs to develop and for raising the newly hatched worms. We are in the process of developing techniques for the introduction of transspecific DNA into the worm embryos and characterizing the (potentially) transgenic animals that result. We have developed an improved extraction procedure for carboxylic acids from earthworms. This method gives about twice the recovery of previous methods.
