Conflicting selection on workers underlies global honey bee colony losses

Endosymbionts and honey bee colony losses?

Honey bees, Apis mellifera, are essential pollinators for the maintenance of natural biodiversity and agriculture [1]. Colony losses witnessed throughout the Northern hemisphere are therefore worrying [2], especially because no single driver has yet emerged as the definitive cause [3]. Interactions between viruses, ectoparasitic mites and microsporidian endoparasites are most likely key factors...

The colony environment modulates sleep in honey bee workers.

One of the most important and evolutionarily conserved roles of sleep is the processing and consolidation of information acquired during wakefulness. In both insects and mammals, environmental and social stimuli can modify sleep physiology and behavior, yet relatively little is known about the specifics of the wake experiences and their relative contribution to experience-dependent modulation o...

Factors Affecting Global Bee Health Honey Bee Health and Population Losses in Managed Bee Colonies

Honey Bee-Infecting Plant Virus with Implications on Honey Bee Colony Health

Honey bees are eusocial insects that are commercially managed to provide pollination services for agricultural crops. Recent increased losses of honey bee colonies (averaging 32% annually since 2006) are associated with the incidence and abundance of pathogens. In their study in mBio, J. L. Li et al. [mBio 5(1):e00898-13, 2014, doi:10.1128/mBio.00898-13] share their discovery that a plant virus...

Feromoni Pčela Honey Bee Colony Pheromones

Pheromones are chemicals produced as liquids by specialised cells or glands and transmitted into the environment as liquids or gases. In contrary to hormones, which are excreted in organism and have effect exclusively on organism that produced them, pheromones are excreted outside organism and effect on different individuals of the same species. Pheromones mediate nearly all aspects of honeybee...