Floral tea polyphenols can improve honey bee memory retention and olfactory sensitivity

Gong, Zhiwen; Gu, Gaoying; Wang, Yuan; Dong, Shihao; Tan, Ken; Nieh, James C.

doi:10.1016/j.jinsphys.2020.104177

Cited by 9 publications

(11 citation statements)

References 35 publications

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“…In fact, honeybees fed 1.04μmol ml −1 caffeine were more likely to remember a conditioned scent than the respective control at both 24 and 72 hours after conditioning, but not 10 minutes after conditioning (Wright et al ., 2013). Nevertheless, honeybees fed 0.05μmol ml −1 and 0.51μmol ml −1 caffeine showed stronger memory retention at two and 24 hours post-treatment, with more recent treatment resulting in stronger recall (Gong et al ., 2021). Similarly, high concentrations of caffeine (> 10.32μmol ml −1 ) lead to a significant decrease in memory retention five minutes post-treatment (Mustard et al ., 2012).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…In this case, each ant’s second visit occurred in increasing 30-minute intervals going up to over 120 minutes since the end of its first visit. This followed previous literature reporting delayed caffeine effects ranging between 30-120 minutes in honey bees (Mustard et al ., 2012; Gong et al ., 2021). From the second visit onwards, ants were allowed back onto the Y-maze as soon as possible.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Invasive ant learning is not affected by seven potential neuroactive chemicals

Galante

Czaczkes

2022

Preprint

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Nectar-feeding insects are often the victims of psychoactive manipulation, with plants lacing their nectar with secondary metabolites such as alkaloids and non-protein amino acids which often boost learning, foraging, or recruitment. However, the effect of neuroactive chemicals has seldomly been explored in ants. Argentine ants (Linepithema humile) are one of the most damaging invasive alien species worldwide. Enhancing or disrupting cognitive abilities, such as learning, has the potential to improve management efforts, for example by increasing preference for a bait, or improving ants' ability to learn its characteristics or location. Here, we test the effects of seven potential neuroactive chemicals - two alkaloids: caffeine and nicotine; two biogenic amines: dopamine and octopamine, and three non-protein amino acids: β-alanine, GABA and taurine - on the cognitive abilities of invasiveL. humileusing bifurcation mazes. Our results confirm that these ants are strong associative learners, requiring as little as one experience to develop an association. However, we show no short-term effect of any of the chemicals tested on spatial learning, and in addition no effect of caffeine on short-term olfactory learning. This lack of effect is surprising, given the extensive reports of the tested chemicals affecting learning and foraging in bees. This mismatch could be due to the heavy bias towards bees in the literature, a positive result publication bias, or differences in methodology.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Invasive ant learning is not affected by seven potential neuroactive chemicals

Galante

Czaczkes

2022

Preprint

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“…Here we found in tea flowers, as well as tea leaves, that EGCG and ECG are the dominant catechins. The catechins mainly distributed in RE and ST. Catechins, particularly ECG, were perhaps advantageous to pollinators, such as bees, to improve the fertility rate ( Gong et al., 2021 ). Catechin biosynthesis has been well studied in tea plants.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…In tea flowers, as well as young tea leaves ( Shi et al., 2021 ), epigallocatechin gallate (EGCG) and epicatechin gallate (ECG) were also the major types of catechin. Abundant caffeine was also detected in tea flowers, playing critical roles in the interaction between tea flowers and bees ( Huang et al., 2016 ; Gong et al., 2021 ). Caffeine has been identified as a kind of nervous system stimulant to improve the brain memory behavior of bees ( Wright et al., 2013 ; Gong et al., 2021 ; Hempel de Ibarra & Rands, 2021 ).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Abundant caffeine was also detected in tea flowers, playing critical roles in the interaction between tea flowers and bees ( Huang et al., 2016 ; Gong et al., 2021 ). Caffeine has been identified as a kind of nervous system stimulant to improve the brain memory behavior of bees ( Wright et al., 2013 ; Gong et al., 2021 ; Hempel de Ibarra & Rands, 2021 ). In tea flowers, many kinds of amino acids, particularly theanine, were also detected ( Jia et al., 2016 ).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Integrating metabolite and transcriptome analysis revealed the different mechanisms of characteristic compound biosynthesis and transcriptional regulation in tea flowers

Tang

Shen

et al. 2022

Front. Plant Sci.

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The flowers of tea plants (Camellia sinensis), as well as tea leaves, contain abundant secondary metabolites and are big potential resources for the extraction of bioactive compounds or preparation of functional foods. However, little is known about the biosynthesis and transcriptional regulation mechanisms of those metabolites in tea flowers, such as terpenoid, flavonol, catechins, caffeine, and theanine. This study finely integrated target and nontarget metabolism analyses to explore the metabolic feature of developing tea flowers. Tea flowers accumulated more abundant terpenoid compounds than young leaves. The transcriptome data of developing flowers and leaves showed that a higher expression level of later genes of terpenoid biosynthesis pathway, such as Terpene synthases gene family, in tea flowers was the candidate reason of the more abundant terpenoid compounds than in tea leaves. Differently, even though flavonol and catechin profiling between tea flowers and leaves was similar, the gene family members of flavonoid biosynthesis were selectively expressed by tea flowers and tea leaves. Transcriptome and phylogenetic analyses indicated that the regulatory mechanism of flavonol biosynthesis was perhaps different between tea flowers and leaves. However, the regulatory mechanism of catechin biosynthesis was perhaps similar between tea flowers and leaves. This study not only provides a global vision of metabolism and transcriptome in tea flowers but also uncovered the different mechanisms of biosynthesis and transcriptional regulation of those important compounds.

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