Researchers Find Genetic Diversity Key to Survival of Honey Bee Colonies

When it comes to honey bees, more mates is better. A new study from North Carolina State University, the University of Maryland and the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) shows that genetic diversity is key to survival in honey bee colonies – a colony is less likely to survive if its queen has had a limited number of mates.

“We wanted to determine whether a colony’s genetic diversity has an impact on its survival, and what that impact may be,” says Dr. David Tarpy, an associate professor of entomology at North Carolina State University and lead author of a paper describing the study. “We knew genetic diversity affected survival under controlled conditions, but wanted to see if it held true in the real world. And, if so, how much diversity is needed to significantly improve a colony’s odds of surviving.”

Tarpy took genetic samples from 80 commercial colonies of honey bees (Apis mellifera）在美国东部地评估每个殖民地的遗传多样性，这反映了殖民地女王的男性数量。女王的伴侣越多，殖民地的遗传多样性越高。然后，研究人员在10个月内几乎每月履行殖民地的健康 - 这是商业蜜蜂殖民地的全部工作“季节”。

研究人员发现，女王在10个月的工作赛季中幸存下至少七次交配的殖民地至少七次。具体而言，48％的菌落与群体至少七次交配的群体在本赛季结束时仍然活着。只有17％的遗传多样化的殖民地存活。“48％的生存率仍然是一个惊人的生存率，但它远远超过17％，”Tarpy说。

“This study confirms that genetic diversity is enormously important in honey bee populations,” Tarpy says. “And it also offers some guidance to beekeepers about breeding strategies that will help their colonies survive.”

The paper, “遗传多样性影响商业蜂蜜蜜蜂殖民地的殖民地生存,” was published online this month in the journal自然科学期刊。合著者啊f the study are Dr. Dennis vanEngelsdorp of the University of Maryland and Dr. Jeffery Pettis of USDA. The work was supported by the USDA Cooperative State Research, Education and
推广服务，美国农业部农业研究服务，北卡罗来纳州农业和消费者服务部和国家蜂蜜委员会。

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Note to Editors:The study abstract follows.

“Genetic diversity affects colony survivorship in commercial honey bee colonies”

Authors：David R. Tarpy，北卡罗来纳州立大学;丹尼斯·瓦伦德尔斯多洛夫，马里兰大学;和Jeffery S. Pettis，USDA-ARS BEE研究实验室

Published： 2013年六月，自然科学期刊

DOI: 10.1007/s00114-013-1065-y

Abstract:蜜蜂 （Apis mellifera) queens mate with unusually high numbers of males (average of approximately 12 drones), although there is much variation among queens. One main consequence of such extreme polyandry is an increased diversity of worker genotypes within a colony, which has been shown empirically to confer significant adaptive advantages that result in higher colony productivity and survival. Moreover, honey bees are the primary insect pollinators used in modern commercial production agriculture, and their populations have been in decline worldwide. Here, we compare the mating frequencies of queens, and therefore, intracolony genetic diversity, in three commercial beekeeping operations to determine how they correlate with various measures of colony health and productivity, particularly the likelihood of queen supersedure and colony survival in functional, intensively managed beehives. We found the average effective paternity frequency (me) of this population of honey bee queens to be 13.6?±6.76, which was not significantly different between colonies that superseded their queen and those that did not. However, colonies that were less genetically diverse (headed by queens withme[less than or equal to]7.0) were 2.86 times more likely to die by the end of the study when compared to colonies that were more genetically diverse (headed by queens withme>7.0). The stark contrast in colony survival based on increased genetic diversity suggests that there are important tangible benefits of increased queen mating number in managed honey bees, although the exact mechanism(s) that govern these benefits have not been fully elucidated.