The poisoned kiss of the honeybee

[gavin]

I could never get my head around mouthparts that go sideways rather than up and down like all self-respecting vertebrate creatures. It seems that honeybees don't just bite with their mandibles, but inject an anaesthetic to paralyse their foes too.

Read on at PLoS One (http://www.plosone.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0047432), or see the abstract below.

G.

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The Bite of the Honeybee: 2-Heptanone Secreted from Honeybee Mandibles during a Bite Acts as a Local Anaesthetic in Insects and Mammals

Alexandros Papachristoforou1,Alexia Kagiava1, Chrisovalantis Papaefthimiou, Aikaterini Termentzi, Nikolas Fokialakis, Alexios-Leandros Skaltsounis, Max Watkins, Gérard Arnold, George Theophilidis

Honeybees secrete 2-heptanone (2-H) from their mandibular glands when they bite. Researchers have identified several possible functions: 2-H could act as an alarm pheromone to recruit guards and soldiers, it could act as a chemical marker, or it could have some other function. The actual role of 2-H in honeybee behaviour remains unresolved. In this study, we show that 2-H acts as an anaesthetic in small arthropods, such as wax moth larva (WML) and Varroa mites, which are paralysed after a honeybee bite. We demonstrated that honeybee mandibles can penetrate the cuticle of WML, introducing less than one nanolitre of 2-H into the WML open circulatory system and causing instantaneous anaesthetization that lasts for a few minutes. The first indication that 2-H acts as a local anaesthetic was that its effect on larval response, inhibition and recovery is very similar to that of lidocaine. We compared the inhibitory effects of 2-H and lidocaine on voltage-gated sodium channels. Although both compounds blocked the hNav1.6 and hNav1.2 channels, lidocaine was slightly more effective, 2.82 times, on hNav.6. In contrast, when the two compounds were tested using an ex vivo preparation–the isolated rat sciatic nerve–the function of the two compounds was so similar that we were able to definitively classify 2-H as a local anaesthetic. Using the same method, we showed that 2-H has the fastest inhibitory effect of all alkyl-ketones tested, including the isomers 3- and 4-heptanone. This suggests that natural selection may have favoured 2-H over other, similar compounds because of the associated fitness advantages it confers. Our results reveal a previously unknown role of 2-H in honeybee defensive behaviour and due to its minor neurotoxicity show potential for developing a new local anaesthetic from a natural product, which could be used in human and veterinary medicine.

[GRIZZLY]

Gavin , Perhaps you would translate the article into simple terms for us mere mortals.

[Mellifera Crofter]

This page (http://www.vita-europe.com/secrets-of-the-honeybee-bite-revealed/) from Vita is a help.

Kitta

[chris]

Our results reveal a previously unknown role of 2-H in honeybee defensive behaviour and due to its minor neurotoxicity show potential for developing a new local anaesthetic from a natural product, which could be used in human and veterinary medicine.

and could be injected painlessly with a needle inspired by the mosquito's probiscis.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/1909086.stm

[gavin]

I hate mosquitoes but if their bodyparts lead to painless injections maybe I'll change my mind.

Grizzly: bees bites carry small doses of anaesthetic, enough to paralyse a wax moth grub or a Varroa mite and, perhaps, render them easier to grab and carry out the front door.

[Rosie]

I read that article with some interest. It could be very relevant in the selection for varroa tolerance (or intolerance if they groom them off). I wondered though if the painkilling properties of propolis comes from the bee rather than the raw material from trees. If so the painkiller could be extracted from propolis rather than the bee's bite. I'm sure medical science will discover propolis one day. It seems to be one of the traditional cures than modern science has turned its back on. You're a scientist Gavin - why can't they see what's under their noses?

[chris]

You're a scientist Gavin - why can't they see what's under their noses?

Because they're looking through microscopes?:p

[gavin]

Exactly, Chris. And while we're not optically challenged in that way, we're being wined and dined by nasty big companies so that we spend our spare time defending them on bee fora. Any other scientists on the list, feel free to chime in and agree.

(I'm being ironic, or something!)

[Rosie]

That might have been tongue in cheek Gavin but I am sure there's a grain of truth in it. Those nasty big companies, however, have their own scientists but, understandably, they would rather spend millions researching patentable stuff than spend thousands proving what has been known for thousands of years.

I would not expect businesses to put anything above company profits but the system of government sponsorship of research projects should put the good of the population above all else. In our own little field the NBU's failure to approve oxalic acid is a case in point.

I could rant on about the naivety of GPs as well but I'm wandering off topic.

[gavin]

Hi Steve

There is already quite a literature on propolis. For example:

http://scholar.google.co.uk/scholar?hl=en&q=propolis&btnG=&as_sdt=1%2C5&as_sdtp=

This is one of the better reviews. I didn't know that birch, pine, acacia and horse chestnut all add to the more widely known poplar as sources of resin.

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0278691597001452

Is there an obvious gap you'd like to see researched?

As for GPs, well, they do have to cover a wide field. Go well armed with print-outs from Google Scholar when you go, that is my advice (but if my GP reads this I'll get shot next time I go!).

cheers

G.

[Jon]

Go well armed with print-outs from Google Scholar..

If Steve had varicose veins he would turn up at the surgery with a scattergram.

[Jimbo]

Gavin, Wined and Dined by the big nasty chemical companies. All I ever got was a few free pens with their company name on them. Hang on does that mean I am in their pay. Note to self must go and check my bank account.

[gavin]

I don't recall ever getting any pens ... well, maybe one (actually I think that I stole that one from a colleague who had picked it up somewhere) .... but maybe your topic is more prone to bungs for you to trouser, to quote the terminology of a certain Martin elsewhere. Have to say I don't check my bank balance that often, so you never know.

I do recall a conference meal once upon a time which was sponsored by industry. Does that count? And I did, embarassingly, get given a free and rather cheap-looking canvas bag (you could imagine that the local prisoners threw it together) at a plant breeding meeting in Holland once upon a time. It has 'Monsanto' emblazoned across it. I've been saving it so that I can find the right occasion to present it to a smallish fellow from the Glasgow area.

[Neils]

I got a rather nice bag recently. I had to mingle with all sorts of shady characters including men in skirts and others blowing into a straw inserted into an angry cat to get it though. The pinnacle of the event was a demonstration of the non spilling wine glass.