Parrot Acronyms - Planned Parrothood.

PARROT TRIVIA

ACRONYMS

B&G = Blue & Gold Macaw

BCC = Blue Crowned Conure

BE2 = Bare Eyed Cockatoo

BFA = Blue Fronted Amazon

BHP = Blue Headed Pionus

BP2 = Black Palm Cockatoo

BSL = Blue Streak Lory

BTM = Blue Throated Macaw

BWP = Bronze Wing Pionus

C2 = Citron Cockatoo

CAG = Congo African Grey

CHC = Cherry Headed Conure

CM = Catalina Macaw

DYH = Double Yellow Head Amazon

E2 = Eleonora Cockatoo

G2 = Goffins Cockatoo

GCC = Green Cheeked Conure

GCP = Grey Cheeked Parakeet

GE = Grand Eclectus

GSC = Greater Sulphur Cockatoo

ACRONYMS

GWM =Green Winged Macaw

HM = Hahns Macaw

HMC = Half Moon Conure

HYM = Hyacinth Macaw

KEET = Parakeet

LB = Lovebird

LB2 = Leadbetters Cockatoo

LSC = Lesser Sulphur Cockatoo

M2 = Moluccan Cockatoo

MBC = Maroon Belly Conure

MM = Miligold Macaw

MM2 = Major Mitchell Cockatoo

MRHA = Mexican Red Head Amazon

MSC = Medium Sulphur Cockatoo

OWA = Orange Winged Amazon

PA = Panama Amazon

PC = Painted Conure

RB2 = Rose Breasted Cockatoo

RLA = Red Lored Amazon

RM = Ruby Macaw

ACRONYMS

RP = Ringneck Parakeet

RSE = Red Sided Eclectus

RV2 = Red Vented Cockatoo

SC = Sun Conure

SIE = Soloman Island Eclectus

SENNIE = Senegal Parrot

SM = Scarlet Macaw

SYH = Single Yellowhead Amazon

T2 = Triton Cockatoo

TAG = Timneh African Grey

TIEL = Cockatiel

TOO = Cockatoo

U2 = Umbrella Cockatoo

VE = Vosmaeri Eclectus

WF = Whitefaced Cockatiel

WCP = White Capped Pionus

WFA = White Fronted Amazon

YCM = Yellow Collared Macaw

YNA = Yellow Naped Amazon

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Arizona State University has found a "novel" chemistry at work in parrots' feather colors. For more than a century, biochemists have known that parrots use an unusual set of pigments to produce their rainbow of plumage colors, but their biochemical identity has remained elusive. Now, an Arizona State University researcher has uncovered the chemistry behind the colors of parrots, describing on a molecular level what is responsible for their bright red feathers. The work casts a new light on what is chemically responsible for the colors of birds, and defies previous assumptions and explanations for color variations in parrots, said Kevin McGraw, an assistant professor in ASU's School of Life Sciences. "Evolutionary biologists have not really thought hard about parrot coloration," said McGraw. "This research is exposing a whole new world of color communication in parrots and the potential physiological and biochemical roles of the new molecules we found in our work."

They found a suite of five molecules, called polyenal lipochromes (or psittacofulvins), that color parrot plumage red in all of the species studied. "We've uncovered a system where all red parrots use the same set of molecules to color themselves," McGraw said. It is a unique pigment found nowhere else in the world. We are fascinated at how parrots are able to do this. The fact that there is a single set of molecules unique to and widespread among parrots, suggests that it is a pretty important evolutionary novelty, and one we should carefully consider when we think about why parrots are so strikingly colorful," McGraw said.

McGraw said an interesting aspect of the five polyenal lipochromes that provide the red in parrots, is that the pigment is found only in the bird's feathers and nowhere else in the body of the bird, indicating that parrots manufacture these molecules internally and directly at the maturing follicles of the growing, colorful plumage.

Editor's note: Is this evolutionary - or is this just another wonder of the Greatest Engineer's biodiversities?
http://www.innovations-report.de/html/berichte/biowissenschaften_chemie/bericht-40481.html