Octopamine increases individual and collective foraging in a neotropical stingless bee

Abstract

The biogenic amine octopamine (OA) is a key modulator of individual and social behaviours in honeybees, but its role in the other group of highly eusocial bees, the stingless bees, remains largely unknown. In honeybees, OA mediates reward perception and affects a wide range of reward-seeking behaviours. Thus, we tested the hypothesis that OA increases individual foraging effort and collective food source exploitation in the neotropical stingless bee Plebeia droryana . OA treatment caused a significant increase in the number of bees at artificial sucrose feeders and a 1.73-times higher individual foraging frequency. This effect can be explained by OA lowering the sucrose response threshold and, thus, increasing the perceived value of the food source. Our results demonstrate that, similar to its effects on honeybees, OA increases both individual and collective food source exploitation in P. droryana . This suggests that, despite having evolved many complex behaviours independently, OA might have similar regulatory effects on foraging behaviours in the two groups of highly eusocial bees.

Octopamine affects gustatory responsiveness and associative learning performance in bumble bees

“…Our understanding of how OA mediates collective foraging in other social bees (e.g. Meliponinae; Mc Cabe et al, 2017; Peng et al, 2020) is equally limited. Within Bombus , only five prior studies have, to our knowledge, directly measured or manipulated OA.…”

Use of waggle dance information in honey bees is linked to gene expression in the antennae, but not in the brain

“…Social insect behaviour and, in particular, foraging strategies are linked to gene expression in the brain (Ingram et al, 2011; Robinson et al, 2008; Toth & Robinson, 2009; Toth et al, 2010; Zayed & Robinson, 2012). Behavioural variation among workers and within foragers seems to be strongly connected to biogenic amine signalling, such as dopamine, octopamine, tyramine, and serotonin signalling (Arenas et al, 2020; Barron et al, 2002; Liang et al, 2012; Linn et al, 2020; Mercer & Menzel, 1982; Peng et al, 2020, 2021; Scheiner et al, 2002, 2017; Schulz et al, 2003). Transcriptomic differences between behavioural groups were typically studied by investigating the entire brain (e.g., Alleman et al, 2019; Liang et al, 2012; Whitfield et al, 2003).…”

Tyramine 1 Receptor Distribution in the Brain of Corbiculate Bees Points to a Conserved Function

“…In M. scutellaris octopamine increases gustatory responsiveness similar to honeybees [McCabe et al, 2017]. In another stingless bee, Plebeia droryana, octopamine treatment increases the number of bees at artificial sucrose feeders, which was interpreted by an octopaminedriven lowering of the individual sucrose response threshold [Peng et al, 2020], similar to the effect observed in honeybees [Barron et al, 2002;Barron and Robinson, 2005]. However, these data suggest that modulation of sucrose responsiveness is likely more complex and, in addition to tyramine and its specific receptors, further modulators such as octopamine have to be considered.…”