title: Origin and function of the major royal jelly proteins of the honeybee (Apis mellifera) as members of the yellow gene family.
abstract: In the honeybee, Apis mellifera, the queen larvae are fed with a diet exclusively composed of royal jelly (RJ), a secretion of the hypopharyngeal gland of young worker bees that nurse the brood. Up to 15% of RJ is composed of proteins, the nine most abundant of which have been termed major royal jelly proteins (MRJPs). Although it is widely accepted that RJ somehow determines the fate of a female larva and in spite of considerable research efforts, there are surprisingly few studies that address the biochemical characterisation and functions of these MRJPs. Here we review the research on MRJPs not only in honeybees but in hymenopteran insects in general and provide metadata analyses on genome organisation of mrjp genes, corroborating previous reports that MRJPs have important functions for insect development and not just a nutritional value for developing honeybee larvae.
authors.affiliation: Departamentul de Apicultură şi Sericicultură, Facultatea de Zootehnie şi Biotehnologii, Universitatea de Ştiinţe Agricole şi Medicină Veterinară, Cluj-Napoca, 400372, Romania; Institut für Biologie, Zoologie-Molekulare Ökologie, Martin-Luther-Universität Halle-Wittenberg, Halle, 06099, Germany.
authors.forename: Anja
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Buttstedt
authors.forename: Robin F A
authors.initials: RF
authors.lastname: Moritz
authors.forename: Silvio
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Erler
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D001516:Bees / Q000235:genetics* / Q000502:physiology*; D005227:Fatty Acids / Q000737:chemistry / Q000378:metabolism*; D005786:Gene Expression Regulation / Q000502:physiology*; D019476:Insect Proteins / Q000145:classification* / Q000235:genetics / Q000378:metabolism*; D007814:Larva / Q000254:growth & development; D000099219:Royal Jelly
chemical_list: D005227:Fatty Acids; D019476:Insect Proteins; D000099219:Royal Jelly
keywords: Apis mellifera; Hymenoptera; MRJP; apalbumin; caste differentiation; genome organisation; major royal jelly protein; royal jelly; royalactin; social insect