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Two bees or not two bees? Researchers take first look at the genetic differences between queen and worker honeybees
January 09, 2001For the first time scientists have been able to examine the genetic processes that decide whether a juvenile bee is destined for life as a worker or as a queen. By stringing together a series of images that describe which genes are active, researchers at the Bee Research Laboratory and the University of Arizona have been able to picture exactly how hormones triggered by environmental and nutritional influences cause larvae to activate the genes necessary to fulfil their destiny.
Female honeybees, Apis mellifera, begin life as bipotential larva with the capability to develop into one of two castes, either worker or queen. “The ability of young from the same species to differentiate into different castes is known as polyphenism“, says Dr Jay Evans from the Bee Research Laboratory in a new research article due to be published in the January issue of Genome Biology next week. “This is the first genomic-scale view of such polyphenic development,” he continues.
The researchers used gene-expression profiles, known as arrays, to establish exactly which genes were active as the larvae developed. From the outset, the team found that those larvae destined to become queen bees appeared to down-regulate some of the genes characteristic of bipotential larva and switch on a distinct set of caste-related genes, including genes responsible for metabolism and respiration. Worker bees, they found, continued to express more of the genes typical of the juvenile larva. This difference in gene expression is thought to lead to a difference in the size and function of organs that gives the upper hand to queen bees as they develop.
“This may reflect the costs of a high-stakes race between queen and larvae to develop quickly and gain direct fitness as heads of the colony,” says Evans. “Developing queens that emerge first, even if only by a matter of hours, almost always beat rival queens in gaining control of colony reproduction.”
Such polyphenic studies are useful because they reflect the effects of external stimuli on an important fork between different developmental pathways, exploring both the functional and evolutionary relationships. In future studies, the team hope to analyse the expression of genes after applying specific hormones to the larvae in order to gain a greater understanding of the processes involved.
PLEASE MENTION GENOME BIOLOGY AS THE SOURCE OF THIS ITEM
AND INCLUDE A LINK TO THE ARTICLE.
The article is availble in full at:
http://genomebiology.com/2000/2/1/research/0001/?mail=0000036
Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC)
“This may reflect the costs of a high-stakes race between queen and larvae to develop quickly and gain direct fitness as heads of the colony,” says Evans. “Developing queens that emerge first, even if only by a matter of hours, almost always beat rival queens in gaining control of colony reproduction.”
Such polyphenic studies are useful because they reflect the effects of external stimuli on an important fork between different developmental pathways, exploring both the functional and evolutionary relationships. In future studies, the team hope to analyse the expression of genes after applying specific hormones to the larvae in order to gain a greater understanding of the processes involved.
PLEASE MENTION GENOME BIOLOGY AS THE SOURCE OF THIS ITEM
AND INCLUDE A LINK TO THE ARTICLE.
The article is availble in full at:
http://genomebiology.com/2000/2/1/research/0001/?mail=0000036
Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC)
Genome Current Events and Genome News RSSTime of day matters to thirsty trees, U of T researcher discovers
The time of day matters to forest trees dealing with drought, according to a new paper produced by a research team led by Professor Malcolm Campbell, University of Toronto Scarborough's vice-principal for research and colleagues in the department of cell and systems biology at the St. George campus.
Genetic analysis helps dissect molecular basis of cardiovascular disease
Using highly precise measurements of plasma lipoprotein concentrations determined by nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy (NMR), researchers led by Daniel Chasman at Brigham and Women's Hospital and Harvard Medical School in Boston, MA, the Framingham Heart Study in Framingham, and the PROCARDIS consortium in Stockholm, Sweden and Oxford, England performed genetic association analysis across the whole genome among 17,296 women of European ancestry from the Women's Genome Health Study.
Gene mismatch influences success of bone marrow transplants
A commonly inherited gene deletion can increase the likelihood of immune complications following bone marrow transplantation, an international team of researchers reports in the November 22 advance online issue of Nature Genetics.
Scientists at UA, collaborating institutions decode maize genome
Scientists from the University of Arizona led by Arizona Genomics Institute director Rod A. Wing and from collaborating institutions have deciphered the complete genetic code of the maize plant for the first time.
Ancestry attracts, but love is blind
People preferentially marry those with similar ancestry, but their decisions are not necessarily based on hair, eye or skin colour.
WPI Researchers Take Aim at Hard-to-Treat Fungal Infections
A team of researchers at the Worcester Polytechnic Institute (WPI) Life Sciences and Bioengineering Center at Gateway Park has developed a new model system to study fungal infections.
Technique finds gene regulatory sites without knowledge of regulators
A new statistical technique developed by researchers at the University of Illinois allows scientists to scan a genome for specific gene-regulatory regions without requiring prior knowledge of the relevant transcription factors.
Causative gene of a rare disorder discovered by sequencing only protein-coding regions of genome
For the first time, scientists have successfully used a method called exome sequencing to quickly discover a previously unknown gene responsible for a mendelian disorder.
New research into the mechanisms of gene regulation
A team led by Penn State's Ross Hardison, T. Ming Chu Professor of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, has taken a large step toward unraveling how regulatory proteins control the production of gene products during development and growth.
Maize cell wall genes identified, giving boost to biofuel research
Purdue University scientists have helped identify and group the genes thought to be responsible for cell wall development in maize, an effort that expands their ability to discover ways to produce the biomass best suited for biofuels production.
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