Introducing the INSIGNIA project: environmental monitoring of pesticide use through honey bees

INSIGNIA aims to design and test an innovative, non-invasive, scientifically proven citizen science environmental monitoring protocol for the detection of pesticides by honey bees. It is a 30-month pilot project initiated and financed by the EC (PP-1-1-2018; EC SANTE). The study is being carried out by a consortium of specialists in honey bees, apiculture, statistics, analytics, modelling, extension, social science and citizen science from twelve countries. Honey bee colonies are excellent bio-samplers of biological material such as nectar, pollen and plant pathogens, as well as non-biological material such as pesticides or airborne contamination. Honey bee colonies forage over a circle of 1 km radius, increasing to several km if required, depending on the availability and attractiveness of food. All material collected is accumulated in the hive.The honey bee colony can provide four main matrices for environmental monitoring: bees, honey, pollen and wax. Because of the non-destructive remit of the project, for pesticides, pollen is the focal matrix and used as trapped pollen and beebread in this study. Although beeswax can be used as a passive sampler for pesticides, this matrix is not being used in INSIGNIA because of its polarity dependent absorbance, which limits the required wide range of pesticides to be monitored. Alternatively, two innovative non-biological matrices are being tested: i) the “Beehold tube”, a tube lined with the generic absorbent polyethylene-glycol PEG, through which hive-entering bees are forced to pass, and ii) the “APIStrip” (Absorbing Pesticides In-hive Strips) with a specific pesticide absorbent which is hung between the bee combs.Beebread and pollen collected in pollen traps are being sampled every two weeks to be analysed for pesticide residues and to record foraging conditions. Trapped pollen provides snapshots of the foraging conditions and contaminants on a single day. During the active season, the majority of beebread is consumed within days, so beebread provides recent, random sampling results. The Beehold tube and the APIStrips are present throughout the 2-weeks sampling periods in the beehive, absorbing and accumulating the incoming contaminants. The four matrices i.e. trapped pollen, beebread, Beehold tubes and APIStrips will be analysed for the presence of pesticides. The botanical origin of trapped pollen, beebread and pollen in the Beehold tubes will also be determined with an innovative molecular technique. Data on pollen and pesticide presence will then be combined to obtain information on foraging conditions and pesticide use, together with evaluation of the CORINE database for land use and pesticide legislation to model the exposure risks to honey bees and wild bees. All monitoring steps from sampling through to analysis will be studied and rigorously tested in four countries in Year 1, and the best practices will then be ring-tested in nine countries in Year 2. Information about the course of the project, its results and publications will be available on the INSIGNIA website www.insignia-bee.eu and via social media: on Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/insigniabee.eu/); Instagram insignia_bee); and Twitter (insignia_bee). Although the analyses of pesticide residues and pollen identification will not be completed until December 2019, in my talk I will present preliminary results of the Year 1 sampling.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Introducing the INSIGNIA project: Environmental monitoring of pesticides use through honey bees

INSIGNIA aims to design and test an innovative, non-invasive, scientifically proven citizen science environmental monitoring protocol for the detection of pesticides via honey bees. It is a pilot project initiated and financed by the European Commission (PP-1-1-2018; EC SANTE). The study is being carried out by a consortium of specialists in honey bees, apiculture, chemistry, molecular biology, statistics, analytics, modelling, extension, social science and citizen science from twelve countries. Honey bee colonies are excellent bio-samplers of biological material such as nectar, pollen and plant pathogens, as well as non-biological material such as pesticides or airborne contamination. Honey bee colonies forage over a circle of about 1 km radius, increasing to several km if required depending on the availability and attractiveness of food. All material collected is concentrated in the hive, and the honey bee colony can provide four main matrices for environmental monitoring: bees, honey, pollen and wax. For pesticides, pollen and wax are the focal matrices. Pollen collected in pollen traps will be sampled every two weeks to record foraging conditions. During the season, most of pollen is consumed within days, so beebread can provide recent, random sampling results. On the other hand wax acts as a passive sampler, building up an archive of pesticides that have entered the hive. Alternative in-hive passive samplers will be tested to replicate wax as a “pesticide-sponge”. Samples will be analysed for the presence of pesticides and the botanical origin of the pollen using an ITS2 DNA metabarcoding approach. Data on pollen and pesticides will be then be combined to obtain information on foraging conditions and pesticide use, together with evaluation of the CORINE database for land use and pesticide legislation to model the exposure risks to honey bees and wild bees. All monitoring steps from sampling through to analysis will be studied and tested in four countries in year 1, and the best practices will then be ring-tested in nine countries in year 2. Information about the course of the project and its results and publications will be available in the INSIGNIA website www.insignia-bee.eu.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

More Insight Into The Chemical Composition Of Greek Propolis; Differences And Similarities With Turkish Propolis

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Detection of the deformed wing virus of bees using the polymerase chain reaction: a review with reference to method performance

The honey bee is of fundamental significance for the ecological balance of the planet and in effect, global crop and animal production. In recent years, the Deformed wing virus (DWV) has been recognised as a major threat to bees, causing an infection that can result in high colony losses. Effectively, the accurate detection of the pathogenic types of the specific virus acquires key-significance. The polymerase chain reaction (PCR) has been used for this purpose by many research groups. The specific technology confers speed and sensitivity but is delicate and prone to false reactions. In this respect, it was considered significant to conduct a review of the PCR methods developed to this day for the detection of the DWV, in order to assess their efficiency for their potential use in practice. The record of the reports that were selected to be included in this study consists only of those that are described with reference to pre-, and post-analytical evaluation, and have been reported more than once in the literature, by the team that developed them and others. The relevant publications were organised in seven groups consisting of the reports that refer to the application, the optimisation and/or the validation of the protocols developed originally by an equal number of research teams. This review is concluded with suggestions deducted from the result of the analysis, about how the limitations of the relevant research conducted to this day could be overcome

The Impact of Vairimorpha (Nosema) ceranae Natural Infection on Honey Bee (Apis mellifera) and Bee Bread Microbiota

Honey bees face new challenges, ranging from climate crisis to emerging pathogens such as Vairimorpha (Nosema) ceranae that synergistically cause a syndrome designated as colony collapse disorder (CCD). This study employed a metataxonomic approach in order to investigate if V. ceranae affects gut microbiota (bacteria and fungi) of adult A. mellifera honey bees as well as microbiota of bee bread (BB) stored in colonies demonstrating severe V. ceranae infection (spore counts >2,500,000 per bee) as compared with colonies exhibiting very low spore counts (<40,000 per bee). Alpha-diversity analysis revealed an overall decrease in microbial diversity reflected by number of observed unique operating taxonomic units (OTUs) regarding both bacteria and fungi in honey bee and ΒΒ samples. Further analysis demonstrated that Podosphaera spp. were absent in BB samples collected from colonies with high spore counts, while relative abundance of Blumeria spp. was significantly decreased. Interestingly, relative abundance of Rosenbergiella spp. was increased in BB samples collected from colonies with high spore counts. The reason for these findings remains elusive. Although further research is warranted, overall reduced microbial diversity and relative abundance of certain microbial groups may serve as biomarkers of colony collapse. © 2022 by the authors

INSIGNIA: um projeto de monitorização ambiental de pesticidas através da utilização da abelha mellifera

INSIGNIA ("cItizeN Science InvestiGatioN for pestIcIcides in Apicultutarl products"; https://www.insignia-bee,eu/) é um projecto financiado pela agência "Directorate General for Health and Food Safety" da Comissão Europeia, e que teve início em Outubro de 2018. O consórcio INSIGNIA é coordenado por Jozef van der Steen e integra 16 instituições parceiras de 12 países Europeus, entre as quais está o Centro de Investigação e Montanha (CIMO) do Instituto Politécnico de Bragança (IPB).Um dos objetivos do projeto INSIGNIA é desenvolver um protocolo para monitorização ambiental através do pólen. O protocolo será aplicado num contexto de ciência do cidadão, pelo que os apicultores serão parte ativa no processo de amostragem ambiental através da colheita bimensal de pólen nas suas colmeias. As amostras de pólen serão analisadas relativamente a resíduos de pesticidas (autorizados e não autorizados) e medicamentos de uso veterinário. Adicionalmente, serão determinados parâmetros botânicos das misturas de pólen (número de espécies e abundância relativa) recorrendo a técnicas de metagenómica e sequenciação de nova geração, estando esta tarefa sob responsabilidade do CIMO.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Summer brood interruption as integrated management strategy for effective Varroa control in Europe

Most Varroa induced colony losses occur during the autumn or winter season as a consequence of an elevated Varroa infestation level and an insufficient health status of the adult bees. Even with an initial low Varroa infestation in early spring, critical mite and virus infection levels can be reached before winter if colonies continuously rear brood throughout the whole season. To overcome this challenge, beekeepers can artificially interrupt brood production by suitable management procedures, depending on their type of beekeeping operation. To assess their efficacy, associated workload, and impact on colony development, different methods for brood interruption (queen caging with the combination of oxalic acid treatment, total brood removal, trapping comb technique) were tested during two seasons in 11 locations on 370 colonies in 10 European countries. A protocol was developed to standardize the methods' application across different environmental conditions. The efficacy of queen caging depended on the mode of oxalic acid application and ranged from 48.16% to 89.57% mite removal. The highest efficacies were achieved with trickling a 4.2% solution (89.57%) and with the sublimation of 2 g of oxalic acid (average of 88.25%) in the broodless period. The efficacy of the purely biotechnical, chemical-free trapping comb and brood removal methods did not differ significantly from the queen caging groups. We conclude that a proper application of one of the described brood interruption methods can significantly contribute to an efficient Varroa control and to the production of honey bee products meeting the highest quality and food-safety standards

Bio-Monitoring of environmental pollution using the citizen science approach

Honeybee colonies are excellent bio-samplers of biological material such as nectar, pollen, and plant pathogens, as well as non-biological material such as pesticides or airborne contamination. The INSIGNIA-EU project aims to design and test an innovative, non-invasive, scientifically proven citizen science environmental monitoring protocol for the detection of pesticides, microplastics, heavy metals, and air pollutants by honey bee colonies http://insignia-eu.eu. In the pilot INSIGNIA project (2018-2021), a protocol was developed and tested for citizen-science-based monitoring of pesticides using honeybees. As part of the project, biweekly pollen was obtained from sentinel apiaries over a range of European countries and landscapes and analysed for botanical origin, using state-of-theart molecular techniques such as metabarcoding. An innovative non-biological matrix, the “APIStrip”, was also proved to be very efficient for detecting the residues of 273 agricultural pesticides and veterinary products, both authorized and unauthorized. The data collected are used to develop and test a spatial modelling system aimed at predicting the spatiallyexplicit environmental fate of pesticides and honeybee landscape-scale pollen foraging, with a common underlying geo-database containing European land-use and land-cover data (CORINE), the LUCAS database (landcover) supplemented with national data sets on agricultural and (semi-) natural habitats. After a call by the European Commission, a new 2 years project was granted aiming to present a comprehensive pan-European environmental pollution monitoring study with honey bees. Although pesticides used in agriculture, are a known hazard due to their biological activity, other pollutants, have even been recognized as such, for which we have not been aware of their impact for many years. An example is air pollution which increased while our societies industrialized and is currently regarded as the single largest environmental health risk in Europe (https://www.eea.europa.eu/). Unfortunately, other pollutants such as heavy metals, polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, polychlorinated biphenyls, airborne particulate matter, and microplastics have also reached our environment. The outcome of this project will provide the first standardized EU-wide monitoring of all types of environmental pollutants with honey bee colonies. The project is funded by the EU, under the N° 09.200200/2021/864096/SER/ ENV.D.2 contract.EU, under the N° 09.200200/2021/864096/SER/ ENV.D.2 contractinfo:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio