DNA in honey could describe the changes in flower visits and microbe encounters of honey bees over decades.

ABSTRACT: Recent environmental changes due to land-use and climate change threaten biodiversity and the ecosystem services it provides. Understanding the true scope of these changes is complicated by the lack of historical baselines for many of the interactions underpinning ecosystem services, such as pollination, or disservices, such as disease spreading. To assess changes in such services, it is vital to find ways of comparing past and current interactions between species. Here, we focus on interactions between honey bees - one of the world's most important agricultural pollinators, the plants they visit, and the microbes they encounter in the environment. DNA in honey offers insights into the contemporary interactions of honey bees. Old honey samples could serve to describe honey bees' interactio

SUBMITTER: Cirtwill AR 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC11909190 | biostudies-literature | 2025 Mar

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature