Publications

condition-dependent virulence of slow bee paralysis virus in bombus terrestris: are the impacts of honeybee viruses in wild pollinators underestimated?	slow bee paralysis virus (sbpv)-previously considered an obligate honeybee disease-is now known to be prevalent in bumblebee species. sbpv is highly virulent in honeybees in association with varroa mites, but has been considered relatively benign otherwise. however, condition-dependent pathogens can appear asymptomatic under good, resource abundant conditions, and negative impacts on host fitness may only become apparent when under stressful or resource-limited conditions. we tested whether sbpv ...	2017	28361244
the combined effects of a monotonous diet and exposure to thiamethoxam on the performance of bumblebee micro-colonies.	there is a pressing need to better understand the factors contributing to declines of wild pollinators such as bumblebees. many different contributors have been postulated including: loss of flower-rich habitats and nesting sites; monotonous diets; impacts of invasive pathogens; exposure to pesticides such as neonicotinoids. past research has tended to investigate the impacts of these stressors in isolation, despite the increasing recognition that bees are simultaneously exposed to a combination ...	2017	28135666
direct determination of the mutation rate in the bumblebee reveals evidence for weak recombination-associated mutation and an approximate rate constancy in insects.	accurate knowledge of the mutation rate provides a base line for inferring expected rates of evolution, for testing evolutionary hypotheses and for estimation of key parameters. advances in sequencing technology now permit direct estimates of the mutation rate from sequencing of close relatives. within insects there have been three prior such estimates, two in nonsocial insects (drosophila: 2.8 × 10(-)(9) per bp per haploid genome per generation; heliconius: 2.9 × 10(-)(9)) and one in a social s ...	2017	28007973
male bumblebees perform learning flights on leaving a flower but not when leaving their nest.	female bees and wasps demonstrate, through their performance of elaborate learning flights, when and where they memorise features of a significant site. an important feature of these flights is that the insects look back to fixate the site that they are leaving. females, which forage for nectar and pollen and return with it to the nest, execute learning flights on their initial departure from both their nest and newly discovered flowers. to our knowledge, these flights have so far only been stud ...	2017	27994042
a new method for quick and easy hemolymph collection from apidae adults.	bio-analysis of insects is increasingly dependent on highly sensitive methods that require high quality biological material, such as hemolymph. however, it is difficult to collect fresh and uncontaminated hemolymph from adult bees since they are very active and have the potential to sting, and because hemolymph is rapidly melanized. here we aimed to develop and test a quick and easy method for sterile and contamination-free hemolymph sampling from adult apidae. our novel antennae method for hemo ...	2017	28125668
long-term prevalence of the protists crithidia bombi and apicystis bombi and detection of the microsporidium nosema bombi in invasive bumble bees.	an initial survey in 2009 carried out at a site in northwestern patagonia region, argentina, revealed for the first time in south america the presence of the flagellate crithidia bombi and the neogregarine apicystis bombi, two pathogens associated with the palaearctic invasive bumble bee bombus terrestris. in order to determine the long-term persistence and dynamics of this microparasite complex, four additional collections at the same site (san carlos de bariloche) were conducted along the foll ...	2017	28085231
floral sonication is an innate behaviour in bumblebees that can be fine-tuned with experience in manipulating flowers.	bumblebees demonstrate an extensive capacity for learning complex motor skills to maximise exploitation of floral rewards. this ability is well studied in nectar collection but its role in pollen foraging is less well understood. floral sonication is used by bees to extract pollen from some plant species with anthers which must be vibrated (buzzed) to release pollen. pollen removal is determined by sonication characteristics including frequency and amplitude, and thus the ability to optimise son ...	2017	27194824
diet effects on bumblebee health.	among physiological processes, the maintenance of immunity is one of the most energetically costly in invertebrates. disease resistance can be quantified by measuring immunocompetence, which is defined as the ability of an organism to mount an immune response, either in cellular, humoral or behavioural forms. in insects, immune capacity can be affected by a variety of factors including pesticides, genetic diversity or diet. here we focus on an important species of domesticated pollinator, bombus ...	2017	27836801
differences in pollination success between local and foreign flower color phenotypes: a translocation experiment with gentiana lutea (gentianaceae).	the adaptive maintenance of flower color variation is frequently attributed to pollinators partly because they preferentially visit certain flower phenotypes. we tested whether gentiana lutea-which shows a flower color variation (from orange to yellow) in the cantabrian mountains range (north of spain)-is locally adapted to the pollinator community.	2017	28194308
fast learning in free-foraging bumble bees is negatively correlated with lifetime resource collection.	despite widespread interest in the potential adaptive value of individual differences in cognition, few studies have attempted to address the question of how variation in learning and memory impacts their performance in natural environments. using a novel split-colony experimental design we evaluated visual learning performance of foraging naïve bumble bees (bombus terrestris) in an ecologically relevant associative learning task under controlled laboratory conditions, before monitoring the life ...	2017	28356567
bumblebees require visual pollen stimuli to initiate and multimodal stimuli to complete a full behavioral sequence in close-range flower orientation.	flower visits are complex encounters, in which animals are attracted by floral signals, guided toward the site of the first physical contact with a flower, land, and finally take up floral rewards. at close range, signals of stamens and pollen play an important role to facilitate flower handling in bees, yet the pollen stimuli eliciting behavioral responses are poorly known. in this study, we test the response of flower-naive bumblebees (bombus terrestris) toward single and multimodal pollen sti ...	2017	28331576
bumblebees can discriminate between scent-marks deposited by conspecifics.	bumblebees secrete a substance from their tarsi wherever they land, which can be detected by conspecifics. these secretions are referred to as scent-marks, which bumblebees are able to use as social cues. although it has been found that bumblebees can detect and associate scent-marks with rewarding or unrewarding flowers, their ability at discriminating between scent-marks from bumblebees of differing relatedness is unknown. we performed three separate experiments with bumblebees (bombus terrest ...	2017	28266572
separation of different pollen types by chemotactile sensing in bombus terrestris.	when tasting food, animals rely on chemical and tactile cues, which determine the animal's decision on whether or not to eat food. as food nutritional composition has enormous consequences for the survival of animals, food items should generally be tasted before they are eaten or collected for later consumption. even though recent studies confirmed the importance of e.g. gustatory cues, compared to olfaction only little is known about the representation of chemotactile stimuli at the receptor le ...	2017	28183868
evaluation of the toxicity of fungicides to flight muscle mitochondria of bumblebee (bombus terrestris l.).	insects pollinate 75% of crops used for human consumption. over the last decade, a substantial reduction in the abundance of pollinating insects has been recorded and recognized as a severe matter for food supply security. many of the important food crops destined for human consumption are grown in greenhouses. a unique feature of greenhouse agriculture is the extensive use of fungicides to curb multiple fungal infections. the most widely used pollinating insects in greenhouses are commercially ...	2017	28043329
establishment risk of the commercially imported bumblebee bombus terrestris dalmatinus-can they survive uk winters?	bumblebees are regularly exported to countries outside their native range for the purposes of commercial pollination. in contrast to the tight regulations imposed on biological control introductions, the movement of bumblebees has largely been without risk assessment. this study represents the first formal assessment of establishment risk for bombus terrestris dalmatinus in the uk. the ability of workers to survive winter conditions is seen as the primary barrier to establishment, given the year ...	2017	26855454
colony contact contributes to the diversity of gut bacteria in bumblebees (bombus terrestris).	social bees, like honeybees and bumblebees, have a close contact with nest mates of different developmental stages and generations. this could enhance bacterial transfer between nest mates and offers opportunities for direct transfer of symbionts from one generation to the next, resulting in a stable host specific gut microbiota. gut symbionts of honeybees and bumblebees have been suggested to contribute in digestion and protection against parasites and pathogens. here we studied the impact of c ...	2017	26503284