Entomology: Asian honeybees parasitize the future dead

The queen of a honeybee colony has a reproductive monopoly because her workers' ovaries are normally inactive and any eggs that they do lay are eaten by their fellow workers. But if a colony becomes queenless, the workers start to lay eggs, stop policing and rear a last batch of males before the colony finally dies out. Here we show that workers of the Asian dwarf red honeybee Apis florea from other colonies exploit this interval as an opportunity to move in and lay their own eggs while no policing is in force. Such parasitism of queenless colonies does not occur in the western honeybee A. mellifera and may be facilitated by the accessibility of A. florea nests, which are built out in the open.     

Apis mellifera capensis蜜蜂失控自复制导致的正常群落破坏

提出对Apis mellifera capensis蜂造成Apis mellifera scutellata蜂群破坏的机制的一种新猜测，并根据logistic模型分别讨论这种猜测和已有的MARTIN猜测所导致的不同性质和规律，对2种猜测进行了比较．加强对社会成员之间信息网络的管理和监督，这也许是更加有效地防止破坏性子群体泛滥的途径．     

Royalactin induces queen differentiation in honeybees

The honeybee (Apis mellifera) forms two female castes: the queen and the worker. This dimorphism depends not on genetic differences, but on ingestion of royal jelly, although the mechanism through which royal jelly regulates caste differentiation has long remained unknown. Here I show that a 57-kDa protein in royal jelly, previously designated as royalactin, induces the differentiation of honeybee larvae into queens. Royalactin increased body size and ovary development and shortened developmental time in honeybees. Surprisingly, it also showed similar effects in the fruitfly (Drosophila melanogaster). Mechanistic studies revealed that royalactin activated p70 S6 kinase, which was responsible for the increase of body size, increased the activity of mitogen-activated protein kinase, which was involved in the decreased developmental time, and increased the titre of juvenile hormone, an essential hormone for ovary development. Knockdown of epidermal growth factor receptor (Egfr) expression in the fat body of honeybees and fruitflies resulted in a defect of all phenotypes induced by royalactin, showing that Egfr mediates these actions. These findings indicate that a specific factor in royal jelly, royalactin, drives queen development through an Egfr-mediated signalling pathway.     

Queen activation of lazy workers in colonies of the eusocial naked mole-rat.

Evolutionary conflicts of interest are expected to arise in genetically diverse social groups. In eusocial insect societies, a potential conflict exists between the queen and her workers over how active the workers should be, and evidence exists that queen aggression increases activity levels of her lazier workers. Here I provide evidence that queen aggression (shoving) in laboratory colonies of the eusocial mammal, the naked mole-rat (Heterocephalus glaber), is a convergently evolved manifestation of queen-worker conflict over worker activity. Queen-initiated shoves activate inherently lazy workers, which tend to be larger and/or less related to the queen than are infrequently shoved, industrious workers. In addition, queen removal selectively depresses the activity of workers that are larger and less related to her. Finally, queen shoving and worker inactivity are pronounced when colonies are satiated but not when colonies are hungry, indicating that the underlying 'work-conflict' is highly context-specific.     

Social parasitism by male-producing reproductive workers in a eusocial insect

The evolution of extreme cooperation, as found in eusocial insects (those with a worker caste), is potentially undermined by selfish reproduction among group members. In some eusocial Hymenoptera (ants, bees and wasps), workers can produce male offspring from unfertilized eggs. Kin selection theory predicts levels of worker reproduction as a function of the relatedness structure of the workers' natal colony and the colony-level costs of worker reproduction. However, the theory has been only partially successful in explaining levels of worker reproduction. Here we show that workers of a eusocial bumble bee (Bombus terrestris) enter unrelated, conspecific colonies in which they then produce adult male offspring, and that such socially parasitic workers reproduce earlier and are significantly more reproductive and aggressive than resident workers that reproduce within their own colonies. Explaining levels of worker reproduction, and hence the potential of worker selfishness to undermine the evolution of cooperation, will therefore require more than simply a consideration of the kin-selected interests of resident workers. It will also require knowledge of the full set of reproductive options available to workers, including intraspecific social parasitism.     

Insights into social insects from the genome of the honeybee Apis mellifera

Here we report the genome sequence of the honeybee Apis mellifera, a key model for social behaviour and essential to global ecology through pollination. Compared with other sequenced insect genomes, the A. mellifera genome has high A+T and CpG contents, lacks major transposon families, evolves more slowly, and is more similar to vertebrates for circadian rhythm, RNA interference and DNA methylation genes, among others. Furthermore, A. mellifera has fewer genes for innate immunity, detoxification enzymes, cuticle-forming proteins and gustatory receptors, more genes for odorant receptors, and novel genes for nectar and pollen utilization, consistent with its ecology and social organization. Compared to Drosophila, genes in early developmental pathways differ in Apis, whereas similarities exist for functions that differ markedly, such as sex determination, brain function and behaviour. Population genetics suggests a novel African origin for the species A. mellifera and insights into whether Africanized bees spread throughout the New World via hybridization or displacement.     

Neotropical Africanized honey bees have African mitochondrial DNA

Non-indigenous African honey bees have invaded most of South and Central America in just over 30 years. The genetic composition of this population and the means by which it rapidly colonizes new territory remain controversial. In particular, it has been unclear whether this 'Africanized' population has resulted from interbreeding between African and domestic European bees, or is an essentially pure African population. Also, it has not been known whether this population expanded primarily by female or by male migration. Restriction site mapping of 62 mitochondrial DNAs of African bees from Brazil, Venezuela and Mexico reveals that 97% were of African (Apis mellifera scutellata) type. Although neotropical European apiary populations are rapidly Africanized by mating with neotropical African males, there is little reciprocal gene flow to the neotropical African population through European females. These are the first genetic data to indicate that the neotropical African population could be expanding its range by female migration.     

4种昆虫基因组中的线粒体假基因

为了进一步了解昆虫核基因组中线粒体假基因(Numts)序列分布情况,避免Numts序列对基于线粒体DNA(mtDNA)进行系统发育关系研究结果的误导,利用Blast N对GenBank中已完成核基因组和mtDNA测序的4种昆虫核基因组中的Numts序列进行检索,结果表明:冈比亚按蚊Anopheles gambiae中没有Numts序列;黑腹果蝇Drosophila melanogaster中仅有少量Numts序列;赤拟谷盗Tribolium castaneum和意大利蜜蜂Apis melliera基因组中Numts序列超过100条,尤其是意大利蜜蜂中的Numts序列涵盖全部mtDNA.ND2,ND4,ND5,COⅠ与lrRNA向核内转移频率高于其他mtDNA基因片段,因此,在使用其进行系统发育关系研究时需加倍谨慎.     

Olfaction: scent-triggered navigation in honeybees

The honeybee, Apis mellifera, navigates rapidly and accurately to food sources that are often kilometres away. They achieve this by learning visual cues, such as the location and colour of nectar-bearing flowers, and chemical cues, such as the scent and the taste of the nectar. Here we train bees to visit differently scented sugar feeders placed at specific outdoor locations and find that they can be induced to visit the same locations simply by having the corresponding scent blown into the hive, even when the destinations no longer have the food or carry the scent. A familiar nectar scent can trigger specific memories of a route and therefore expedite navigation to the food source.     

Genetic study on the behavior of honeybees influenced by polyandry system

Within a honeybee population, due to polyandry, there are supersister and halfsister relations, thus many subfamilies exist. For the Chinese honeybee (Apis cerana cerana F.) a phylogenetic dendrogram has been constructed in which 4 subfamilies are clustered based on DNA fingerprint patterns. And it has been observed that each kind of workers is distributed to several dierent sub-families.     

Complex social behaviour derived from maternal reproductive traits

A fundamental goal of sociobiology is to explain how complex social behaviour evolves, especially in social insects, the exemplars of social living. Although still the subject of much controversy, recent theoretical explanations have focused on the evolutionary origins of worker behaviour (assistance from daughters that remain in the nest and help their mother to reproduce) through expression of maternal care behaviour towards siblings. A key prediction of this evolutionary model is that traits involved in maternal care have been co-opted through heterochronous expression of maternal genes to result in sib-care, the hallmark of highly evolved social life in insects. A coupling of maternal behaviour to reproductive status evolved in solitary insects, and was a ready substrate for the evolution of worker-containing societies. Here we show that division of foraging labour among worker honey bees (Apis mellifera) is linked to the reproductive status of facultatively sterile females. We thereby identify the evolutionary origin of a widely expressed social-insect behavioural syndrome, and provide a direct demonstration of how variation in maternal reproductive traits gives rise to complex social behaviour in non-reproductive helpers.     

含毒死蜱有效成分的杀虫剂对意大利蜂(Apis mellifera L.)的经口毒性

采用摄入法在室内测定了7种含有毒死蜱有效成分的杀虫剂对成年意大利蜂的急性经口毒性.结果表明:所测定的7种杀虫剂对成年意大利的急性经口毒性均为高毒;毒力由高到低的顺序是:10％阿维·毒死蜱乳油＞12％高氯·毒死蜱乳油＞50％毒死蜱微乳剂＞30％甲维·毒死蜱乳油＞30％毒死蜱·三唑磷乳油＞20％毒死蜱·氟铃脲乳油＞22％吡虫·毒死蜱乳油.另外,22％吡虫·毒死蜱乳油对供试蜜蜂24h和48h的致死作用存在明显的差异,其24h LC50值约是48h LC50值的12.6倍.     

东方蜜蜂微孢子虫侵染中华蜜蜂过程中的高表达基因表达谱及其潜在作用

本研究旨在通过高通量测序技术和生物信息学方法探究东方蜜蜂微孢子虫(Nosema ceranae)在侵染中华蜜蜂(Apis cerana cerana,简称中蜂)过程中的高表达基因(highly expressed gene, HEG)表达谱及潜在作用.利用RNA-seq技术对N.ceranae感染后7d和10d的中蜂工蜂中肠进行测序,通过连续比对东方蜜蜂(Apis cerana)和N.ceranae的基因组,滤除中蜂的数据,得到侵染中蜂工蜂的N.ceranae(Nc1和Nc2)的有效读段数分别为180 237 114和36 054 033条.根据FPKM值大于15的标准,从Nc1和Nc2中分别筛选出1 482和901个HEG.Venn分析结果显示二者的共有HEG数为890个,特有HEG数分别为592和11个.GO分类和KEGG通路富集分析结果显示,上述共有HEG分布于24个功能条目和富集于72条代谢通路.进一步分析发现分别有2个HEG富集在与真菌的应激反应和毒力密切相关的MAPK信号通路.此外,N.ceranae的孢壁蛋白等毒力因子编码基因和ATP/ADP转移酶基因等能量代谢相关蛋白编码基因在侵染过程维持高量表达.通过RT-PCR验证了随机挑选的8个HEG的表达.研究结果提供了N.ceranae在侵染中蜂工蜂过程中的HEG表达谱及潜在作用.     

The concepts of 'sameness' and 'difference' in an insect

Insects process and learn information flexibly to adapt to their environment. The honeybee Apis mellifera constitutes a traditional model for studying learning and memory at behavioural, cellular and molecular levels. Earlier studies focused on elementary associative and non-associative forms of learning determined by either olfactory conditioning of the proboscis extension reflex or the learning of visual stimuli in an operant context. However, research has indicated that bees are capable of cognitive performances that were thought to occur only in some vertebrate species. For example, honeybees can interpolate visual information, exhibit associative recall, categorize visual information and learn contextual information. Here we show that honeybees can form 'sameness' and 'difference' concepts. They learn to solve 'delayed matching-to-sample' tasks, in which they are required to respond to a matching stimulus, and 'delayed non-matching-to-sample' tasks, in which they are required to respond to a different stimulus; they can also transfer the learned rules to new stimuli of the same or a different sensory modality. Thus, not only can bees learn specific objects and their physical parameters, but they can also master abstract inter-relationships, such as sameness and difference.     

紫藤传粉昆虫与花粉多型性研究

定位观测了紫藤的访花昆虫种类及觅食行为,用扫描电镜观察了花粉形态。结果表明：紫藤的主要访花昆虫为膜翅目的黄胸木蜂和意大利蜂,两者都有传粉行为,属传粉者。意大利蜂除有传粉行为外还有偷蜜行为。花粉在形态上表现出多型性：长球形（赤道观长椭圆形,极面观近三裂圆形）,三孔沟;三菱锥形（赤道观近三角形,极面观近三角形）,六孔沟;赤道观近三角形,极面观近菱形,四孔沟。外壁纹饰均为橘皮状。     

不同品级拟黑多刺蚁(Polyrhachis vicina)脑部雌激素相关受体基因的表达

采用原位杂交方法对不同品级拟黑多刺蚁(Polyrhachis vicina)脑部雌激素相关受体pvERRmRNA的表达进行了检测.结果表明,pvERRmRNA在不同品级的蕈形体、附叶、视叶、中脑、食道下神经节和球状细胞中都有表达.蚁后蕈形体和球状细胞中pvERRmRNA的阳性表达最为明显;工蚁中脑pvERR mRNA的阳性反应强度明显高于蚁后和雄蚁;pvERR mRNA在雄蚁视叶中有较强的表达.pvERR mRNA在不同品级的拟黑多刺蚁脑部的表达差异可能与它们各自在蚁群中的功能和行为有关.     

黑盾胡蜂的生物学习性

对黑盾胡蜂( Vesp a bicolor ) 的生物学习性进行了研究. 结果表明: 出蛰雌蜂5 月中旬觅址筑巢, 单母建群, 历时36 d 建成具34 个巢房的小巢, 此时雌蜂兼备职蜂和后蜂职能; 该蜂卵期3. 5~ 5. 5 d, 幼虫期10~ 12 d, 蛹期10. 5~ 12. 5 d, 完成发育需24~ 30 d, 并与气温密切相关; 雌蜂日外勤晴天多达42 次, 每次捕食外勤费时6~ 22 min; 职蜂出房后第3 天开始外勤, 雌蜂随即停止外勤专司产卵, 1 a 仅一世代, 12 月中旬弃巢结团越冬. 黑盾胡蜂亲代个体群居分工合作有利于生存和种族繁衍.     

Climatic controls on central African hydrology during the past 20,000 years

Past hydrological changes in Africa have been linked to various climatic processes, depending on region and timescale. Long-term precipitation changes in the regions of northern and southern Africa influenced by the monsoons are thought to have been governed by precessional variations in summer insolation. Conversely, short-term precipitation changes in the northern African tropics have been linked to North Atlantic sea surface temperature anomalies, affecting the northward extension of the Intertropical Convergence Zone and its associated rainbelt. Our knowledge of large-scale hydrological changes in equatorial Africa and their forcing factors is, however, limited. Here we analyse the isotopic composition of terrigenous plant lipids, extracted from a marine sediment core close to the Congo River mouth, in order to reconstruct past central African rainfall variations and compare this record to sea surface temperature changes in the South Atlantic Ocean. We find that central African precipitation during the past 20,000 years was mainly controlled by the difference in sea surface temperatures between the tropics and subtropics of the South Atlantic Ocean, whereas we find no evidence that changes in the position of the Intertropical Convergence Zone had a significant influence on the overall moisture availability in central Africa. We conclude that changes in ocean circulation, and hence sea surface temperature patterns, were important in modulating atmospheric moisture transport onto the central African continent.     

基于微卫星标记的西方蜜蜂抗螨蜂种群体遗传多态性分析

为了分析西方蜜蜂抗螨蜂种的群体遗传多态性情况,采用18对微卫星(SSR)引物对抗螨蜂种子一代和子二代,并与同场饲养不抗螨的本地意蜂和浙大蜜浆高产蜂种进行比对,共计22个群体进行遗传多样性检测.结果表明:遗传一致度在0.2时,抗螨蜂种子代发生一定的分化,其他两个品系基本一致.抗螨蜂种子代之间的亲缘关系较近(遗传距离在0.043 9以内),与本地意蜂和浙大蜜浆高产蜂种各自相互分开.从而对抗螨蜂种的选育和保护具有重要的指导意义.