The Year of the Honey Bee (Apis mellifera L.) with Respect to Its Physiology and Immunity: A Search for Biochemical Markers of Longevity

Abstract

It has been known for many years that in temperate climates the European honey bee, Apis mellifera, exists in the form of two distinct populations within the year, short-living summer bees and long-living winter bees. However, there is only limited knowledge about the basic biochemical markers of winter and summer populations as yet. Nevertheless, the distinction between these two kinds of bees is becoming increasingly important as it can help beekeepers to estimate proportion of long-living bees in hives and therefore in part predict success of overwintering. To identify markers of winter generations, we employed the continuous long-term monitoring of a single honey bee colony for almost two years, which included measurements of physiological and immunological parameters. The results showed that the total concentration of proteins, the level of vitellogenin, and the antibacterial activity of haemolymph are the best three of all followed parameters that are related to honey bee longevity and can therefore be used as its markers.

Changes in haemolymph parameters and insect ability to respond to immune challenge during overwintering

“…Proteins related to cryoprotection (Hahn and Denlinger 2007) can be accumulated during winter, and proteins with metabolic or reproductive functions can be upregulated in the early spring (Xiao et al 2016). Interestingly, the increase in total protein concentration during winter was comparable between sexes and production of sex-specific proteins (e.g., vitellogenin; Xiao et al 2016, Kunc et al 2019 was not clearly manifested in our study.…”

Effects on Some Therapeutical, Biochemical, and Immunological Parameters of Honey Bee (Apis mellifera) Exposed to Probiotic Treatments, in Field and Laboratory Conditions

“…In our study, the levels of carbohydrates (glucose, trehalose) were statistically higher in the experimental groups of honey bee colonies. Usually, the concentrations of carbohydrates are stable during the year, but they rapidly increase when hemolymph sampling is conducted the day after autumn’s administration of sugar syrup in hives [ 76 ]. Moreover, some authors suggest that due to different sugar degradation pathways the beneficial microbes could more successfully colonize a sugar rich digestive system in bees [ 77 ].…”

The Effect of Foraging on Bumble Bees, Bombus terrestris, Reared under Laboratory Conditions

“…Macronutrients, i.e., carbohydrates, lipids and proteins, were measured spectrophotometrically as their total pool in the hemolymph. For determination of carbohydrate level, the anthrone assay was used as described previously [30]. Briefly, the hemolymph samples stored with phenylthiourea at −80 • C were diluted 200× in PBS (pH 7.4), incubated with anthrone reagent (Sigma-Aldrich, St. Louis, MO, USA) and the resulting products were measured as absorbance at 620 nm using spectrophotometer Sense (Hidex, Turku, Finland).…”

“…The antimicrobial activity was measured according to protocol described in Kunc et al [30] as the ability of bumble bee hemolymph to inhibit growth of the Gram-positive bacteria Micrococcus luteus (CCM 169). Briefly, 5 µL of the hemolymph with phenylthiourea was applied into wells punctured in LB agar (4% agar in LB, MOBIO, Carlsbad, CA, USA) plates supplemented with bacteria M. luteus and incubated at 30 • C for 24 h. The resulting inhibition zones around the wells were measured and compared to calibration prepared from pure lysozyme (EC 3.2.1.17; Sigma-Aldrich, St. Louis, MO, USA).…”