Department of Chemistry, Sapienza University of Rome, P.le A. Moro 5, 00185, Rome, Italy; CIABC, Sapienza University of Rome, P.le Aldo Moro 5, 00185 Rome, Italy.
Department of Management, Sapienza University of Rome, Via Del Castro Laurenziano 9, 00161 Rome, Italy.
Chemosphere. 2022 Dec;308(Pt 1):136261. doi: 10.1016/j.chemosphere.2022.136261. Epub 2022 Aug 31.
Bees are precious living beings for our planet. Thanks to their essential service of pollination, these insects allow the maintenance of biodiversity and the variety and amount of food available. Unfortunately, we are observing an increasingly devastating reduction of bee families and other pollinating insects for factors related to human activities, environmental pollution, diseases and parasites, compromise of natural habitats, and climate change. We show that probiotics can protect bees from element pollution. We collected bees, beeswax, honey, pollen, and propolis directly from hives in a rural area of central Italy to investigate the content of 41 elements in control (not supplemented with probiotics) and experimental (supplemented with probiotics) groups. Our data show a significantly lower concentration of some elements (Ba, Be, Cd, Ce, Co, Cu, Pb, Sn, Tl, and U) in experimental bees than in control groups, indicating a possible beneficial effect of probiotics in reducing the absorption of chemicals. This study presents the first data on element levels after probiotics have been fed to bees and provides the basis for future research in several activities relating to the environment, agriculture, economy, territory, and medicine.
蜜蜂是我们星球上珍贵的生物。由于它们授粉的重要作用，这些昆虫维持了生物多样性，以及食物的种类和数量。不幸的是，由于与人类活动、环境污染、疾病和寄生虫、自然栖息地破坏以及气候变化有关的因素，我们观察到蜜蜂和其他传粉昆虫的数量正在急剧减少。我们表明，益生菌可以保护蜜蜂免受元素污染。我们从意大利中部一个农村地区的蜂巢中直接收集蜜蜂、蜂蜡、蜂蜜、花粉和蜂胶，以研究对照组（未补充益生菌）和实验组（补充益生菌）中 41 种元素的含量。我们的数据显示，实验组中一些元素（钡、铍、镉、铈、钴、铜、铅、锡、铊和铀）的浓度明显低于对照组，表明益生菌可能具有减少化学物质吸收的有益作用。这项研究提供了在向蜜蜂投喂益生菌后元素水平的第一批数据，并为未来与环境、农业、经济、领土和医学有关的几项研究奠定了基础。
