Department of Experimental Biology, Faculty of Science, Masaryk University, Brno, Czech Republic.
Department of Mathematical Analysis and Application of Mathematics, Faculty of Science, Palacký University Olomouc, Olomouc, Czech Republic.
PLoS One. 2024 Oct 4;19(10):e0311415. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0311415. eCollection 2024.
The honey bee, Apis mellifera L., is one of the main pollinators worldwide. In a temperate climate, seasonality affects the life span, behavior, physiology, and immunity of honey bees. In consequence, it impacts their interaction with pathogens and parasites. In this study, we used Bayesian statistics and modeling to examine the immune response dynamics of summer and winter honey bee workers after injection with the heat-killed bacteria Serratia marcescens, an opportunistic honey bee pathogen. We investigated the humoral and cellular immune response at the transcriptional and functional levels using qPCR of selected immune genes, antimicrobial activity assay, and flow cytometric analysis of hemocyte concentration. Our data demonstrate increased antimicrobial activity at transcriptional and functional levels in summer and winter workers after injection, with a stronger immune response in winter bees. On the other hand, an increase in hemocyte concentration was observed only in the summer bee population. Our results indicate that the summer population mounts a cellular response when challenged with heat-killed S. marcescens, while winter honey bees predominantly rely on humoral immune reactions. We created a model describing the honey bee immune response dynamics to bacteria-derived components by applying Bayesian statistics to our data. This model can be employed in further research and facilitate the investigating of the honey bee immune system and its response to pathogens.
蜜蜂,Apis mellifera L.,是世界上主要的传粉媒介之一。在温带气候中,季节性会影响蜜蜂的寿命、行为、生理和免疫力。因此,它会影响它们与病原体和寄生虫的相互作用。在这项研究中,我们使用贝叶斯统计和建模来研究夏季和冬季工蜂在注射热灭活细菌粘质沙雷氏菌(一种机会性蜜蜂病原体)后的免疫反应动态。我们使用选定免疫基因的 qPCR、抗菌活性测定和血细胞浓度的流式细胞分析,在转录和功能水平上研究了体液和细胞免疫反应。我们的数据表明,夏季和冬季工蜂在注射后,在转录和功能水平上的抗菌活性增加,冬季蜜蜂的免疫反应更强。另一方面,仅在夏季蜂群中观察到血细胞浓度增加。我们的结果表明,夏季蜂群在受到热灭活 S. marcescens 挑战时会产生细胞反应,而冬季蜜蜂主要依赖体液免疫反应。我们通过将贝叶斯统计应用于我们的数据,创建了一个描述蜜蜂对细菌衍生成分的免疫反应动态的模型。该模型可用于进一步的研究,并有助于研究蜜蜂的免疫系统及其对病原体的反应。