To build a single cell, multiple bees must deposit, mold, and shape the precious wax; given that an unsupervised collective builds the structure, it is unknown whether each bee possess architectural abilities, or if they act as simple automatons.

“In this fundamental study, we looked at a naturally evolved system which solves similar challenges in a near-optimal manner,” said Dr. Kirstin Petersen, a researcher in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at Cornell University.

“Understanding how evolution can lead to these organisms that have architectural tricks gives us insights into how you can build structures that are multipurpose, strong, and resilient to different environmental perturbations,” added Dr. Michael Smith, a researcher in the Department of Biological Sciences at Auburn University, the Department of Collective Behaviour at the Max Planck Institute of Animal Behavior, and the Centre for the Advanced Study of Collective Behaviour at the University of Konstanz.

Bees build two types of hexagonal honeycomb cells: small ones for rearing worker bees and larger ones for rearing drones, the male reproductive bees.

A challenge arises when the bees must link lattices made of smaller cells with the larger ones, because the geometries don’t allow for a seamless fit. One issue is that bees don’t remodel their cells.

“Whatever action they take in one place effectively decides what’s going to happen later,” Dr. Petersen said.

“Also, for honey bees, wax is the most expensive material energetically. When they build something out of wax, they’re being as frugal as possible.”

As a result, the bees employ other shapes — pentagons or heptagons — in order to link together panels of perfectly hexagonal drone and worker cells.

Along with building cells of different shapes, they bees also build irregular-sized cells, and sometimes even combine multiple types of irregular cells.

The researchers refer to these pairs and triplets of irregular cells as ‘motifs’ and show that particular combinations occur more often than expected by chance.

“Sometimes the bees will switch from building one type of cell to the other, but they make that change gradually, over multiple cells, which suggests they are thinking ahead,” Dr. Petersen said.
In the study, the authors set up 12 colonies in the field with frames that lacked the usual wax and wire inside, so the bees could build natural honeycombs without guides.

At the end of the season, they took specially lit images and then wrote a custom software to automatically identify, sort and measure the vertices, angles, sizes and geometries of thousands of cells.

The researchers developed a theoretical computer model that allowed them to analyze configurations, and test optimal ways cells might fit together in a continuous manner under the space constraints.

“We used the model to ask, how much better could the bees do? And it turns out, not that much better,” Dr. Petersen said.

More than 200 years ago, Swiss entomologist Francoise Huber suggested that bees might use intermediate cells to merge a honeycomb together, but he lacked the modern tools to measure thousands of cells and validate his idea.

“It really required these tools to rigorously show that. So it’s not surprising that no one has done this before,” Dr. Smith said.

A paper on the findings was published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

http://www.sci-news.com/biology/honeybees-skilled-architects-09903.html

The caffeinated bees showed a clear preference for the faux strawberry flowers, with 70.4 of them visiting the target blossoms right away. Just 60 percent of the noncaffeinated but odor-primed subjects made a beeline for the plastic strawberries first, and the bees that received neither caffeine nor the priming scent visited the strawberry flowers a little under half of the time, an expected result because they had never “learned” which plants to try in the first place.

Bees exposed to both caffeine and odor formed a “super strong association” between the two, Arnold says, suggesting that a bee might think: “When I had that odor in the past, I got this really nice [caffeinated] sugar and I remember that really clearly.” With each consecutive flower visit, these bees’ pace also increased faster than that of the noncaffeinated bees—indicating that caffeine might additionally enhance their motor skills.

Though the positive association was strong, it eventually wore off: After visiting dozens of flowers the caffeinated bees started investigating the distractor flowers too, and Arnold points to the laboratory setup as one cause. “Finding plastic flowers that are just a few inches apart from each other … it’s quite an easy task for the bees to solve,” she says. “The bees would sooner or later try out the distractor flowers and realize that they’re equally as rewarding.” But in a field of strawberry plants, real-life “distractor” flowers would be much farther away, and it might take the bees longer to stray from their task. In an agricultural setting, caffeine could be supplied alongside priming scents for specific plants in commercial hives, Arnold says. Farmers could place the caffeinated hives in their fields for the bees to pollinate more efficiently.

Manson says this strategy might be more applicable to farms in the United Kingdom than to those in the United States; U.K. farms tend to be smaller, and it is easier for the pollinators to wander off if untrained. U.S. crops pollinated by bees are often planted in huge fields that are harder to stray from, or grown in greenhouses from which bees cannot escape, she adds.

Whatever industrial application the new findings might lead to, Manson says these experiments’ use of caffeine as a priming stimulant is particularly revelatory. Humans actively seek out caffeine, “and I expect pollinators do, too,” she says. “It’s delicious and awesome.” But because this study had caffeine given in the nest rather than being doled out as a reward at the flower, she says, the experiment is a “strong demonstration” of how caffeine can help teach bees which plants to pollinate.

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/caffeine-boosts-bees-focus-and-helps-them-learn/

The plight of pollinators is growing more visible than ever before. Increasingly, scientists are documenting the decline of bees and butterflies, evidence that the loud hum of buzzing insects on many landscapes is turning to a whisper.

For bees, the threats are numerous, including habitat loss, climate change, and intensive agriculture. As fields of flowering plants are converted to roads and row crops, sources of food for wild pollinators dwindle. And when insects forage in farms, they suffer from poor nutrition due to a lack of diverse food sources and become exposed to agricultural chemicals. Honey bees—a managed, non-native species in the US—are transported into many farms to provide pollination, but still face threats from poor nutrition, pests, and pathogens.

A new analysis in the journal Nature shows that some of these threats, when put together, kill more bees than the combination of each threat alone. It turns out, cocktails of agricultural chemicals may have a synergistic effect on bee mortality. In other words, more bees die than would have if the effects of the chemicals simply added to each other.
The authors of the paper analyzed 90 studies that in total documented 356 effects from interacting bee stressors, such as combinations of chemicals, nutritional problems, and parasites. Each study included at least two factors harming bees. They categorized whether the stressrs negated each other, added to each other, or compounded to cause extra damage— compounding would indicate a synergistic effect. For example, if one pesticide used alone caused 10 percent of bees to die, and another pesticide killed 15 percent, the two combined would have a synergistic effect if more than 25 percent of bees died.

Across the studies, the researchers repeatedly found that when bees were exposed to multiple agrichemicals, the combination had a synergistic effect on mortality. Meanwhile, combos of other stressors, like parasites and nutrition, tended to have effects that just added together.

It’s still unclear why pesticides would have such an effect. In the analysis, the bee stressors didn’t have synergistic effects on non-lethal health measures, like colony growth rates. In other research, however, scientists have found that certain pesticides can weaken a bee’s immune system, potentially making them extra vulnerable to other chemicals or pathogens. There are also numerous other processes that may be responsible for the compounding effect, says Elizabeth Nicholls, an ecologist studying bees at the University of Sussex who was not involved in the analysis. “It also might be that their detoxification pathways might be impaired if they’re being bombarded with lots of chemicals at one time.”

The findings give reason to worry—these pesticide effects held up at realistic levels used in agriculture. Studies have found that bees are exposed to a range of pesticides, both from crops and nearby wildflowers. “Exposure to multiple agrichemicals is the norm, not the exception,” says the study’s lead author Harry Siviter, an ecologist at the University of Texas, Austin. “The actual commercial formulas that are used on farms often have multiple chemicals in them.”

Especially with bees tending to forage across many plants, their chances of getting exposed to multiple toxins are high, says Nicholls. “[The study] shows that you need to be thinking about exposure at a landscape level,” she says. “And it’s not okay just to test exposure from one crop and one chemical.”

We’re already seeing the effects of declining pollinators. In the United States, apples, cherries, and blueberries are among crops threatened by declining pollinators. In southwest China, farmers have to hand pollinate fruit trees to make up for the decline in insects.

Importing extra honey bees to fill the gap isn’t an option, either. Honey bee colonies have experienced greater rates of collapse in recent years. And wild bees are probably even more sensitive to threats, because they tend to be solitary and lack the robust social networks of honey bees. “Wild bees are really important, and those are the bees that are doing really badly,” says Siviter.

An ideal regulatory process for pesticides would look at interactive effects as well as continue monitoring after their initial approval, says Siviter. Right now, the licensing process for pesticides is more limited, with little monitoring after a product is approved and in use. “If you don’t consider the interactions, you’re underestimating the impact of environmental stressors on bees.” That, ultimately, could undermine the abundance of many fruits, vegetables, and nuts at the grocery store.

https://www.popsci.com/science/pesticides-are-killing-bees/

TikTokers have been warned by experts against attempting a new frozen honey challenge as it’s making people feel “sick.”

In this activity, an individual is required to freeze an entire bottle of honey for a couple of hours and then squeezing the contents out and eating it like a popsicle.
The hashtag #FrozenHoney has gone viral on the video-sharing application with over a thousand videos scoring over 600 million views.

A separate hashtag called “#FrozenHoneyChallenge” has additionally been viewed over 80 million times.

It is unclear who started this trend, however, people are now forming their own twisted versions of it. They are adding corn syrup to the blend to make the nectar less thick.
Numerous people have complained that they felt “sick” after trying out frozen honey chunks, as eating a fifth or more of a bottle is causing a surge of sugar load in the body.

“[Be right back] gotta go get my stomach pumped,” wrote one user after eating a chunk of frozen honey.

“I feel sick now,” wrote another person.

According to NBC News, experts warn that people who attempt this trend can face issues like diarrhoea, bloating, stomach cramping, and other side effects.

It can also cause cavities in the teeth.

Lisa Young, an adjunct professor of nutrition at New York University’s Steinhardt School of Culture, Education, and Human Development, told news outlet that she’s worried “about kids going on TikTok to get their information and then following the latest trend and not tuning in to their own, internal stomach.”

“If you try this trend once in a while and you get a stomachache — just because everyone else is doing it — be independent and you don’t have to do it, either,” she said.

https://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/frozen-honey-tiktok-safe-eat-b1895660.html

On April 21, 2021, the American Honey Producers Association (AHPA) and Sioux Honey Association (SHA) filed petitions with the ITC and DOC for relief from dumped imports of raw honey from Argentina, Brazil, India, Ukraine, and Vietnam.  The American Beekeeping Federation (ABF) also supports the trade cases.

On May 18, 2021, the DOC published a notice initiating the investigations in the Federal Register, with estimated dumping margins of 9.75 to 49.44 percent for Argentina, 83.72 percent for Brazil, 27.02 to 88.48 percent for India, 9.49 to 92.94 percent for Ukraine, and 47.56 to 138.23 percent for Vietnam.

DOC is scheduled to issue preliminary determinations of dumping in mid-November, at which point preliminary duties will go into effect, and importers will be obligated to begin paying cash deposits at the time of importation.

On June 4, 2021 the U.S. International Trade Commission (USITC) unanimously determined that there is a reasonable indication that unfairly traded imports of raw honey from Argentina, Brazil, India, Ukraine, and Vietnam are injuring the U.S. industry producing raw honey.

Today’s unanimous decision means that the ITC will continue to investigate the injury inflicted on the U.S. raw honey producers by low-priced imports, and the U.S. Department of Commerce (DOC) will investigate the extent to which imports from the five countries are being sold below fair value in the U.S. market.

We truly appreciate all of the donations that we have received to cover legal fees.

The good fight isn’t over yet, and we still need your support.

To donate to the Antidumping Fund, please contact
Cassie Cox: cassie@ahpanet.com
281-900-9740

Or donate on our secure website: https://www.ahpanet.com/donations-1

There are many delicate structures in animals that could inspire our engineering designs, Zhao says. He and other materials scientists find the living world a source of inspiration. Turns out the buzz about bees may become about far more than just honey.

The summer buzz of honeybees means the sweet reward of honey. But to make enough of this sweet stuff for the hive, bees are in near-constant motion. As they move, overlapping sections of their tough outer skeleton, known as a cuticle (KEW-tih-kul), slide past each other. A study now finds that tiny hairs on that cuticle act as a lubricant. That fuzz reduces friction, which makes it easier for the bees to move.

Researchers could take a lesson or two from those bees, says Jieliang Zhao. He’s a mechanical engineer at Beijing Institute of Technology in China. What his team has just learned could lead to new ways to reduce wear and tear in materials. “For example,” he envisions adding bee-like fuzz to “the sliding edges on the handle of a folding umbrella,” This, he says, should keep the umbrella working smoothly for a longer time.

Honeybees evolved this fuzzy solution to friction, Zhao suspects, to cope with the fact that their bodies are always squirming. Even when a bee perches on a flower to feed or pauses to take a rest, its body is moving. Its head turns. Its legs sweep pollen and debris onto or away from the body. All the while, its abdomen is pulsing as it breathes. It’s this last part of the body that grabbed Zhao’s attention. He and his team wanted to learn how the hard shell-like external skeleton shielding honeybee abdomens could move so much, yet suffer so little damage.

To find out, the researchers recorded video. It showed different segments of the cuticle slide past each other as bee abdomens bend.

Hairy benefits
Next, Zhao’s group removed and cleaned the abdomens of bees that had died naturally. Then the researchers examined them using scanning electron microscopy. Some segments of cuticle were covered with tiny hairs. Each hair was very tiny — just 100 to 200 micrometers long. That’s about the same length as the width of two human hairs placed side-by-side.

Each hair in this fuzz is also branched. Dozens of tiny projections jut out from either side of a central shaft. The tip of each one is shaped like a tiny cone. The team wondered if the hairs’ unusual shape might reduce friction when pieces of the cuticle slide against each other.

To find out, the researchers cut out pieces of fuzz-covered cuticle. It came from a part of the abdomen that slides under a neighboring, bald piece. Zhao’s team cut out two pieces of that bald cuticle from elsewhere on the abdomen and connected one of them to an atomic force microscope. This tool allowed the team to measure friction as that piece slid over the other two.

The tiny hairs reduced friction, they found. And by a lot — up to 40 percent, compared to the smooth piece. “Forked hairs can improve the smoothness of the contact area,” Zhao now concludes.

As the cuticle moves across the hairs, energy builds up within the hairs. This makes it easier for the bee to move the segments, he says. There is also “less pressure with the object being touched,” Zhao explains. All of these features help cut friction between parts of the cuticle that rub against each other.

The Beijing team described its findings in the June 2 ACS Applied Materials & Interfaces.

“Mother Nature has developed many processes that are much more efficient than what we as people have invented,” says Neil Canter. He’s a chemist at Chemical Solutions in Willow Grove, Penn. Honeybee hairs are a good example, he adds. Friction ups the energy used in a process. Cutting friction, then, will lead to energy savings and sustainability, he points out.

https://www.sciencenewsforstudents.org/article/abdominal-fuzz-makes-bee-bodies-super-slippery