prakel
29-08-2015, 09:40 AM
An interest piece of research on the development of queens and worker bees.
CHAMPAIGN, Ill. -- A closer look at how honey bee colonies determine which larvae will serve as workers and which will become queens reveals that a plant chemical, p-coumaric acid, plays a key role in the bees' developmental fate.
The study, reported in the journal Science Advances, shows that broad developmental changes occur when honey bee larvae - those destined to be workers - are switched from eating royal jelly (a glandular secretion) to a diet of jelly that includes honey and beebread (a type of processed pollen).
Beebread and honey contain p-coumaric acid, but royal jelly does not. Queens feed exclusively on royal jelly. Worker bees known as nurses feed the larvae according to the needs of the hive.
http://us1.campaign-archive2.com/?u=5fd2b1aa990e63193af2a573d&id=2e5a7ac93d&e=57f94334d8
Science Advaces: A dietary phytochemical alters caste-associated gene expression in honey bees. 28/8/15
http://advances.sciencemag.org/content/1/7/e1500795.full
CHAMPAIGN, Ill. -- A closer look at how honey bee colonies determine which larvae will serve as workers and which will become queens reveals that a plant chemical, p-coumaric acid, plays a key role in the bees' developmental fate.
The study, reported in the journal Science Advances, shows that broad developmental changes occur when honey bee larvae - those destined to be workers - are switched from eating royal jelly (a glandular secretion) to a diet of jelly that includes honey and beebread (a type of processed pollen).
Beebread and honey contain p-coumaric acid, but royal jelly does not. Queens feed exclusively on royal jelly. Worker bees known as nurses feed the larvae according to the needs of the hive.
http://us1.campaign-archive2.com/?u=5fd2b1aa990e63193af2a573d&id=2e5a7ac93d&e=57f94334d8
Science Advaces: A dietary phytochemical alters caste-associated gene expression in honey bees. 28/8/15
http://advances.sciencemag.org/content/1/7/e1500795.full