Project Details
Abstract
A long time mystery is how animals maintain orientation and homing ability during long-distance flight.
Honeybees (Apis mellifera) have the capacity of orientation and homing during long-distance flights. Living
in large colonies and easily manipulated make honeybees a suitable animal model for studies on the
mechanisms of orientation and homing. Hypotheses including vision, smell, and magnetoreception have
been raised. However, honeybee homing mechanisms are still unclear. We focused on finding magnetite
because magnetite is proposed as magnetoreceptor. We found magnetite in the iron granules of bees and
clarified the formation of magnetite. Magnetoreception has been proposed to be used for the orientation and
homing of honeybees, but whether magnetite is the magnetoreceptor is not known. Iron-sulfur cluster
assembly protein 1 (Isca1) and cryptochrome (Cry) are proposed as a magnetoreceptor in pigeons and
fruit flies. Whether these proteins are the magnetoreceptors of bees is also unknown. Our and previous
studies (the distribution of magnetite in iron granules, the mechanism of magnetite formation, and behavior
studies of magnetoreception process under normal functions of vision and smell) make us to further study the
magnetoreception of honeybees.
In this proposal, we ask a fundamental and key question which is whether magnetite, Isca1, or
Cry2 is the magnetoreceptor of bees for magnetoreception. The specific aims of this proposal are: (1)
create honeybees those are defective in magnetoreceptors by RNA interference (RNAi); (2) evaluate
the impact on magnetoreception when honeybees are defective in magnetoreceptors in the
laboratory; (3) investigate the homing rate and flight paths of honeybees those are defective in
magnetoreceptor in the field. We expect to demonstrate that magnetite, Isca1, or Cry2 is the
magnetoreceptor of honeybees for magnetoreception and to provide the useful research model for studying
how animals maintain orientation and homing ability during long-distance flight.
Project IDs
Project ID:PA10607-1266
External Project ID:MOST106-2311-B182-003
External Project ID:MOST106-2311-B182-003
Status | Finished |
---|---|
Effective start/end date | 01/08/17 → 31/07/18 |
Keywords
- Honeybee
- magnetite
- magnetoreception
- RNA interference
- behavior
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