Project description:Expression profiling of honey bee brains as a function of treatments that accelerate the onset of foraging. Treatment groups included three treatments that accelerate the onset of foraging (methoprene [juvenile hormone analog], manganese, and cGMP) and two treatments that do not accelerate the onset of foraging (cAMP and vehicle control).
Project description:This experiment compared gene expression in individual brains of field collected Polistes metricus in four adult behavioral states: solitary foundresses, foraging workers, queens, and pre-overwintering gynes.
Project description:We describe the first comprehensive venom profile of a solitary bee, the European carpenter bee Xylocopa violacea, by using a combined proteo-transcriptomic approach. Transcripts of the venom system are used as specific database to match peptide sequences from mass spectrometry analyses of venom from dissected venom glands and venom injected during a defensive sting. In our analyses, we only discuss the proteo-transcriptomically supported venom components and reveal a diverse venom profile with 43 different protein families of which 32 are identified in the injected venom.
Project description:Scouts and non-scouts (recruits) were collected by using a novelty-seekingM-^] assay. Experiment was conducted in a large outdoor screened enclosure, which enabled us to exert complete control over the location and number of food resources while at the same time studying naturalistic honey bee foraging behavior. Foragers were first trained to a color-marked training feederM-^] that contained unscented 50% sucrose solution (m/v); this initially was the only food source available to them. After 2-3 days of training, a novel feederM-^] was set up in another location in the enclosure, with different color markings and an odor cue. The training feeder was maintained, providing the bees with two possible foraging locations, a familiar and a novel. Scouts were identified as bees that switched foraging from the training feeder to the novel feeder; only bees seen foraging at the novel feeder two or more times and at least once at the training feeder were collected as scouts. Non-scouts (recruits) were collected at the end of the experiments; these were bees that continued to forage at the training feeder, and were never observed to switch to the novel feeder.
Project description:Neonicotinoid insecticides have been implicated in honey bee declines, with many studies showing that sub-lethal exposure impacts bee behaviors such as foraging, learning and memory. Despite the large number of ecotoxicological studies carried out to date, most focus on a handful of worker phenotypes leading to a ‘streetlight effect’ where the a priori choice of phenotypes to measure may influence the results and conclusions arising from the studies. This bias can be overcome with the use of toxicological transcriptomics, where changes in gene expression can provide a more objective view of how pesticides alter animal physiology. Here, we used RNA sequencing to examine the changes in neurogenomic states of nurse and forager honey bees that were naturally exposed to neonicotinoids in the field and artificially exposed to neonicotinoid in a controlled experiment.
Project description:Most species of bee are capable of delivering a defensive sting which is often painful. A solitary lifestyle is the ancestral state of bees and most extant species are solitary, but information on bee venoms comes predominantly from studies on eusocial species. In this study we investigated the venom composition of the Australian great carpenter bee, Xylocopa aruana Ritsema, 1876. We show that the venom is relatively simple, composed mainly of one small amphipathic peptide (XYTX1-Xa1a), with lesser amounts of an apamin homologue (XYTX2-Xa2a) and a venom phospholipase-A2 (PLA2). XYTX1-Xa1a is homologous to, and shares a similar mode-of-action to melittin and the bombilitins, the major components of the venoms of the eusocial Apis mellifera (Western honeybee) and Bombus spp. (bumblebee), respectively. XYTX1-Xa1a and melittin directly activate mammalian sensory neurons and cause spontaneous pain behaviours in vivo, effects which are potentiated in the presence of venom PLA2. The apamin-like peptide XYTX2-Xa2a was a relatively weak blocker of small conductance calcium-activated potassium (KCa) channels and, like A. mellifera apamin and mast cell-degranulating peptide, did not contribute to pain behaviours in mice. While the composition and mode-of-action of the venom of X. aruana are similar to that of A. mellifera, the greater potency, on mammalian sensory neurons, of the major pain-causing component in A. mellifera venom may represent an adaptation to the distinct defensive pressures on eusocial Apidae.
2023-03-11 | PXD038183 | Pride
Project description:Honey bee pollen foraging along an urbanization gradient
Project description:This experiment examines gene expression profiles in the brains of adult honey bee workers (Apis mellifera) performing different behavioral tasks in the hive. The different behavioral groups examined were nurse, comb builder, guard, undertaker, and forager. The comb builder, guard, and undertaker behavioral groups perform their respective tasks over a relatively short time scale (typically 1 day), while nursing and foraging are longer duration (lasting > 1 week). The purpose of this study was to examine whether behaviors that persist over different time scales are associated with differences in the extent of gene expression changes in the brain.