Experimental viral infections in honey bee queens in the field
Ontology highlight
ABSTRACT:
INSTRUMENT(S): timsTOF Pro
ORGANISM(S): Apis Mellifera (ncbitaxon:7460)
SUBMITTER: 
Leonard Foster
PROVIDER: MSV000094113 | MassIVE | Sun Feb 18 17:52:00 GMT 2024
REPOSITORIES: MassIVE
Similar Datasets
Project description:We injected honey bee queens with a combination of BQCV&DWV-B, the same combination of virus that was inactivated with UV, or saline and monitored them in queen monitoring cages for 7 days before sacrificing them and performing proteomics on the hemolymph, ovaries, and eggs that were collected from the cages.
2024-02-18 | MSV000094114 | MassIVE
Project description:Honey bee colonies were maintained in an apiary at the University of British Columbia. During the summer of 2018, 40 queens were reared from a single colony and half were allowed to open mate, while the other half were kept as virgins in plastic queen cages. Two weeks after emergence, the virgin queens were given two, eight-minute carbon dioxide treatments on 2 sequential days, then re-introduced to their nucleus colonies. This process stimulates virgin queens to begin laying71, and we conducted these treatments in order to minimize the physiological differences between virgin and mated queens. Virgin and mated queens were retrieved from their nucleus colonies and half of each (10) were subjected to heat-shock (42 ͦC, 2 h), and then maintained at 30 ͦC for 2 d. The other half were held only at 30 ͦC for 2 d. Four to six weeks after mating, the queens were anesthetized with carbon dioxide, beheaded, then their spermathecae (including the tracheal net) were removed with fine forceps. Both ovaries were also removed and weighed. During the same summer, 200 drones from a different colony in the same apiary were collected and maintained in the laboratory overnight at ambient temperature with excess syrup (50% sucrose). The next day, semen was harvested with glass capillaries according to the methods described above. Because many drones were not sexually mature, 60 semen samples (out of the 200 drones) were collected. Capillaries were placed in petri dishes and half (30) were heat-shocked as described above, then kept at 25 ͦC for 2 d. The other half were only kept at 25 ͦC for 2 d. Ten samples from each experimental group were used for sperm viability assays as described above.
2019-07-19 | PXD013728 | Pride
Project description:Honey bee queens undergo dramatic behavioral (e.g., reduced sexual receptivity), physiological (e.g., ovary activation, ovulation, and modulation of pheromone production) and molecular changes after they complete mating. To elucidate how queen post-mating changes are influenced by seminal fluid, a non-spermatozoa-containing component of semen, we injected queens with semen or seminal fluid alone. We assessed queen sexual receptivity, ovary development, worker retinue response (which is influenced by queen pheromone production), and transcriptional changes in queen abdominal fat body and brain tissues. Injection with either seminal fluid or semen resulted in decreased sexual receptivity, increased attractiveness of queens to workers, and altered expression of several genes that are also regulated in naturally mated queens. The post-mating and transcriptional changes of queens receiving seminal fluid were not significantly different from queens treated with seminal fluid, suggesting that components in seminal fluid, such as seminal fluid proteins, are largely responsible for stimulating post-mating changes in queens.
2020-07-27 | GSE145395 | GEO
Project description:The honey bee queen is the central hub of a colony to produce eggs and release pheromones to maintain social cohesion. Among many environmental stresses, viruses are a major concern to compromise the queen's health and reproductive vigor. Viruses have evolved numerous strategies to infect queens either via vertical transmission from the queens' parents or horizontally through the worker and drones with which she is in contact during development, while mating, and in the reproductive period in the colony. Over 30 viruses have been discovered from honey bees but only few studies exist on the pathogenicity and direct impact of viruses on the queen's phenotype. An apparent lack of virus symptoms and practical problems are partly to blame for the lack of studies, and we hope to stimulate new research and methodological approaches. To illustrate the problems, we describe a study on sublethal effects of Israeli Acute Paralysis Virus (IAPV) that led to inconclusive results. We conclude by discussing the most crucial methodological considerations and novel approaches for studying the interactions between honey bee viruses and their interactions with queen health.
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Project description:Honey bee drones, queens and workers have vastly different phenotypes. Here we profile the the expression level of mRNAs and microRNAs of honeybee, drones, queens and workers at the L5 larval stage (91 hours +/- 1).
2015-09-06 | GSE61253 | GEO
Project description:Mating is a complex process, which is frequently associated with behavioural and physiological changes. However, understanding of the genetic underpinnings of these changes is limited. Honey bees are both a model system in behavioural genomics, and the dominant managed pollinator of human crops; consequently understanding the mating process has both pure and applied value. We used next-generation transcriptomics to probe changes in gene expression in the brains of honey bee queens, as they transition from virgin to mated reproductive status. In addition, we used CO2-narcosis, which induces oviposition without mating, as an experimental control for the mating process. Mating produced significant changes in the expression of vision, chemo-reception, metabolic, and immune-related genes. Differential expression of these genes maps clearly onto known behavioural and physiological changes that occur during the transition from being a virgin queen to a newly-mated queen. A subset of these changes in gene expression were also detected in CO2-treated queens, as predicted from previous physiological studies. In addition, we compared our results to previous studies that used microarray techniques across a range of experimental time-points. Changes in expression of immune- and vision-related genes were common to all studies, supporting an involvement of these groups of genes in the mating process. However, these comparisons also indicate the need to understand the temporal dynamics of gene expression across the entire mating and reproductive process.
2015-09-23 | GSE65833 | GEO
Project description:Adult honey bee queens and workers drastically differ in ovary size. This adult ovary phenotype difference becomes established during the last two larval instars, when massive programmed cell death in the ovaries of worker larvae leads to the degeneration and removal of 95-99% of the ovariole anlagen. The higher juvenile hormone (JH) levels in queen larvae protect their ovaries against such degeneration. To gain insights into the molecular architecture underlying this divergence critical for adult caste fate we performed a microarray analysis contrasting RNA extracts from fourth and early fifth instar queen and worker ovaries. While for the fourth instar we found differential expression (log2FC > 1.0) for only nine genes, the number of differentially represented transcripts (DRTs) increased to 56 in early fifth instar ovaries. From these, 18 had their expression levels further analyzed by real-time PCR (RT-qPCR). For 13 of these the expression differed significantly between queen and worker ovaries at least one time point in development, and interestingly, genes with enzyme functions were overexpressed in workers, while genes related to transcription and signaling were so in queens. For the RT-qPCR confirmed genes we further analyzed their response to JH, revealing a significant up-regulation for two genes, one encoding a short chain dehydrogenase (SDR) and the other heat shock protein 90 (Hsp90). Five other genes, including Hsp60 and hexamerin 70b, were significantly down-regulated by JH. As SDR genes have previously come up as differentially expressed in different transcriptome assays in honey bee larvae, and heat shock proteins are involved in hormone responses, these are interesting candidates for further functional assays.
2016-10-06 | GSE81118 | GEO
Project description:Mating is a complex process that causes many behavioral and physiological changes, but the factors triggering these changes and the underlying molecular processes are not well characterized. Honey bee queens provide a convenient system for dissecting these factors (e.g., physical manipulation, insemination volume, insemination substance) via instrumental insemination. We examined the effects of carbon dioxide (CO2), a commonly used anesthetic in instrumental insemination that causes changes similar to those observed after mating, and physical manipulation, which presumably mimics the act of copulation, on the brain transcriptional changes in honey bee queens. We found significant gene overlap between our study and previous mating studies in honey bee queens and Drosophila. This suggests that molecular pathways regulating the mating process are conserved across different mating regimes of honey bees as well as across insect orders.
2011-01-30 | E-MEXP-2646 | biostudies-arrayexpress
Project description:Queen health is crucial to colony survival of social bees. Recently, queen failure has been proposed to be a major driver of managed honey bee colony losses, yet few data exist concerning effects of environmental stressors on queens. Here we demonstrate for the first time that exposure to field-realistic concentrations of neonicotinoid pesticides during development can severely affect queens of western honey bees (Apis mellifera). In pesticide-exposed queens, reproductive anatomy (ovaries) and physiology (spermathecal-stored sperm quality and quantity), rather than flight behaviour, were compromised and likely corresponded to reduced queen success (alive and producing worker offspring). This study highlights the detriments of neonicotinoids to queens of environmentally and economically important social bees, and further strengthens the need for stringent risk assessments to safeguard biodiversity and ecosystem services that are vulnerable to these substances.
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Project description:Hemolymph from mated and unmated honey bee queens collected in summer 2022.
2024-01-10 | MSV000093805 | MassIVE