Sunflower Pollen and Bumble Bee Health: Mechanisms, Modifiers and Trade-Offs. [PDF]
Ecol EvolBumble bees face increasing pressure from interacting stressors, including pathogens, nutritional limitations, and agricultural intensification. Among natural dietary factors that modulate disease, Asteraceae pollen—particularly sunflower (Helianthus ...
Odemer R.
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Neither sulfoxaflor, Crithidia bombi, nor their combination impact bumble bee colony development or field bean pollination. [PDF]
Sci Rep, 2023 Many pollinators, including bumble bees, are in decline. Such declines are known to be driven by a number of interacting factors. Decreases in bee populations may also negatively impact the key ecosystem service, pollination, that they provide ...
Straw EA +9 more
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Transmission of a bumblebee parasite is robust despite parasite exposure to extreme temperatures. [PDF]
Ecol Evol, 2023 All organisms are exposed to fluctuating environmental conditions, such as temperature. How individuals respond to temperature affects their interactions with one another.
Wolmuth-Gordon HS, Brown MJF.
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Prevalence and Distribution of Three Bumblebee Pathogens from the Czech Republic. [PDF]
Insects, 2022 Bumblebees are significant pollinators for both wild plants and economically important crops. Due to the worldwide decrease in pollinators, it is crucial to monitor the prevalence and distribution of bumblebee pathogens.
Votavová A +5 more
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Differential bumble bee gene expression associated with pathogen infection and pollen diet. [PDF]
BMC Genomics, 2023 Background Diet and parasitism can have powerful effects on host gene expression. However, how specific dietary components affect host gene expression that could feed back to affect parasitism is relatively unexplored in many wild species.
Giacomini JJ +3 more
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Microbial Pressure and Social Immunity: Bumble Bees Increase Brood Hygiene After Exposure to a <i>Bacillus thuringiensis</i>-Based Biopesticide. [PDF]
Ecol EvolIn social insect colonies, diseased or dead brood is identified and removed by workers to prevent the infection of the whole colony. Here, bumble bee larvae exposed to a bacterium (Bacillus thuringiensis ssp. aizawai (strain: ABTS‐1857)) based biopesticide were removed more frequently than wounded or untreated control larvae. This shows that bumble bee
Scheffler M +4 more
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No evidence of effects or interaction between the widely used herbicide, glyphosate, and a common parasite in bumble bees [PDF]
PeerJ, 2021 Background Glyphosate is the world’s most used pesticide and it is used without the mitigation measures that could reduce the exposure of pollinators to it. However, studies are starting to suggest negative impacts of this pesticide on bees, an essential
Edward A. Straw, Mark J.F. Brown
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How Population Structure and Nest Membership Shape Pathogen Patterns in Bumble Bees. [PDF]
Mol EcolABSTRACT Host density, genetic diversity and social groups are key factors influencing pathogen transmission in wildlife populations, but their interactions remain poorly understood in insects. Islands can provide natural laboratories with distinct populations that vary in density and genetic diversity, whereby dense, genetically homogeneous ...
Dobelmann J, Wilfert L.
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Urban landscapes tend to increase the presence of pathogenic protozoa, microsporidia and viruses, but likely decrease the abundance of viruses in wild bees and wasps. [PDF]
Insect Sci• The bees Anthophora plumipes and Osmia cornuta had a higher occurrence probability of the neogregarine protozoan Apicystis bombi in more fragmented urban areas.• In the bee Halictus scabiosae and wasp Polistes dominula, hotter urban areas increased the likelihood of occurrence of viruses.• The viruses were found to be replicative in the samples, and ...
Ferrari A, Cilia G, Polidori C.
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Genomic Variation among Strains of Crithidia bombi and C. expoeki. [PDF]
mSphere, 2019 In this study, we sequenced and analyzed the genomes of 40 strains, in addition to the already-reported two type strains, of two Crithidia species infecting bumblebees in Alaska and Central Europe and demonstrated that different strains of Crithidia ...
Gerasimov E +4 more
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