Pesticide–Virus Interactions in Honey Bees: Challenges and Opportunities for Understanding Drivers of Bee Declines

Harwood, Gyan; Doležal, Adam

doi:10.3390/v12050566

Cited by 43 publications

(43 citation statements)

References 175 publications

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“…The interaction of multiple factors makes it more di cult to understand the reasons for the decline in insect pollinators. Some insecticides can exert additive or synergistic effects on virus-induced mortality and replication in honey bees by affecting their immune system [12]. Diet and virus infection are related in honey bee.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Metagenomic Analysis of Non-Apis Wild Insect Pollinators and Predators Shows Virus Threat to Their Survival

Huang

Wei

et al. 2021

Preprint

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Background: Insect pollinators provide major pollination services for wild plants and crops, this is necessary for both agriculture and ecology, we should protect their population size and diversity as much as possible. Currently, we have known that the virus disease of honeybee can cause serious damage to bee colony, but we know little about the virus of other wild pollinating insects. Here we investigated the virus host wild insect pollinators as a reminder that they are facing virus threaten too.Methods: Transcriptome sequencing was used to investigate the viruses of Non-Apis insect pollinators and predators. Furthermore, host and replicability of several novel viruses that weakly related to honey bee viruses were determined by using reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR).Results: Three honey pathogenic virus, five viruses host insect and twenty-six novel viruses were detected. Seven novel viruses showed weakly similarity to honeybee pathogenic viruses and five of them were determined can be replicated their genomes in the corresponding host by detected complementary strands of viral genomes, suggests that they may be pathogenic to the corresponding host.Conclusion: So many novel viruses detected in wild insect pollinators and their predators indicates that we don’t have a clear understanding of the virus composition in pollinator insect and related species. The same living environment provides the conditions for virus cross infection, we should be alert to this situation in the protection of pollinating insects.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…High-quality food can help honey bee ght viruses. Some insecticides can increase the sensitivity of bees to viruses by affecting their immune mechanism [9][10][11][12][13][14][15].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Metagenomic Analysis of Non-Apis Wild Insect Pollinators and Predators Shows Virus Threat to Their Survival

Huang

Wei

et al. 2021

Preprint

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“…In addition to the extensive work already published on bees: -Straub et al (2020) show that neonicotinoids and ectoparasitic mites act synergistically to weaken honey bee colonies and contribute to colony collapse. -Two literature reviews (Harwood and Dolezal, 2020;O'Neill et al, 2018) document the harmful interactions between pesticides (including neonicotinoids) and immunity to pathogens and parasites. -Paleolog et al (2020) showed the effects of imidacloprid may affect proteolysis, aspartate aminotransferase, alanine aminotransferase, alkaline phosphatase, and global DNA methylation in honeybees.…”

Section: Sub-lethal and Synergistic Effectsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Social, Psychological and Health Impact of Coronavirus Disease (COVID-19) on the Elderly: South African and Italian Perspectives

2021

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Agriculture is critically important for African societies and economies but ensuring food security for Africa’s growing population is a major challenge. One particular concern are pesticides called ‘neonicotinoids’, which render all parts of a plant toxic to all insects and contaminate the soil and water bodies. By exposing all organisms to the toxins, neonicotinoids also harm beneficial insects that provide many important ‘ecosystem services’, such as pollination, soil development, and natural pest control, which are an integral part of sustainable agriculture. Neonicotinoids have contributed to the loss of ecosystem services from pollinators and other insects in Europe and elsewhere, and several of them have been banned in the (European Union) EU and other countries due to their harmful effect on beneficial insects. Africa, with its rich biodiversity and heavy reliance on agricultural production, is one of the fastest-growing pesticide markets in the world, so protecting it from the harmful effects of neonicotinoids is vital to ensuring a sustainable agriculture that provides food security. The Academy of Science of South Africa (ASSAf), in collaboration with the German National Academy of Sciences Leopoldina and the Network of African Science Academies (NASAC) has recently completed a project exploring the use and effects of neonicotinoids in African agriculture. This project brought together experts from 17 African countries, reviewed the relevant African scientific literature, and analysed the state of knowledge on neonicotinoids and their impact on ecosystem services for agriculture and on biodiversity in Africa. The resultant report ‘Neonicotinoid insecticides: use and effects in African agriculture. A review and recommendations to policy makers’ (NASAC, 2019) has collated an unprecedented amount of information, identified gaps in scientific knowledge and research relating to neonicotinoids in Africa, and developed key recommendations from science to policy-makers to ensure the sustainability of African agriculture and thus food security. One year after the launch of the NASAC report, the purpose of this virtual event was to introduce the report, including an update on recent global scientific and African policy developments regarding neonicotinoids, and to discuss its implications with a wide range of stakeholders, with the aim of stimulating policy and research action on this important issue. The target audience and participants included South African and Southern African Development Community (SADC) policymakers, regulatory agencies, government departments, agricultural associations, extension-service providers, research institutes, international development agencies, representatives of embassies, and other interested stakeholders.

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“…Since 2007, beekeepers have been reporting high annual colony losses (vanEngelsdorp et al, 2007(vanEngelsdorp et al, , 2008Kulhanek et al, 2017) caused primarily by stress due to parasitic infestations (Neumann and Carreck, 2010;Steinhauer et al, 2021), pathogenic infections (Berthoud et al, 2010), poor nutrition (Leonhardt and Blüthgen, 2012;Donkersley et al, 2014), and exposure to pesticides (Sanchez-Bayo and Goka, 2014;Dively et al, 2015). These ubiquitous and interacting stressors have been shown to negatively affect various aspects of honey bee health including larval and pupal development (Wu et al, 2011;Chen et al, 2016), longevity (Wu et al, 2011;DeGrandi-Hoffman and Chen, 2015), immune function (Nazzi and Pennacchio, 2018;Harwood and Dolezal, 2020), and memory (van Dame et al, 1995;Siviter et al, 2018). Perhaps one of the more troubling and cryptic effects of these stressors relate to disruptions in the performance of important honey bee social behaviors and alterations to the expected pattern of temporal polytheism (Tasei, 2001;Thompson et al, 2007;Fine and Corby-Harris, 2021).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Behavioral Toxicity of Insect Growth Disruptors on Apis mellifera Queen Care

2021

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As social insects, honey bees (Apis mellifera) rely on the coordinated performance of various behaviors to ensure that the needs of the colony are met. One of the most critical of these behaviors is the feeding and care of egg laying honey bee queens by non-fecund female worker attendants. These behaviors are crucial to honey bee reproduction and are known to be elicited by the queen’s pheromone blend. The degree to which workers respond to this blend can vary depending on their physiological status, but little is known regarding the impacts of developmental exposure to agrochemicals on this behavior. This work investigated how exposing workers during larval development to chronic sublethal doses of insect growth disruptors affected their development time, weight, longevity, and queen pheromone responsiveness as adult worker honey bees. Exposure to the juvenile hormone analog pyriproxyfen consistently shortened the duration of pupation, and pyriproxyfen and diflubenzuron inconsistently reduced the survivorship of adult bees. Finally, pyriproxyfen and methoxyfenozide treated bees were found to be less responsive to queen pheromone relative to other treatment groups. Here, we describe these results and discuss their possible physiological underpinnings as well as their potential impacts on honey bee reproduction and colony performance.

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Pesticide–Virus Interactions in Honey Bees: Challenges and Opportunities for Understanding Drivers of Bee Declines

Cited by 43 publications

References 175 publications

Metagenomic Analysis of Non-Apis Wild Insect Pollinators and Predators Shows Virus Threat to Their Survival

Metagenomic Analysis of Non-Apis Wild Insect Pollinators and Predators Shows Virus Threat to Their Survival

Social, Psychological and Health Impact of Coronavirus Disease (COVID-19) on the Elderly: South African and Italian Perspectives

The Behavioral Toxicity of Insect Growth Disruptors on Apis mellifera Queen Care

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