title: Honey bee (Apis mellifera) drones survive oxidative stress due to increased tolerance instead of avoidance or repair of oxidative damage.
abstract: Oxidative stress can lead to premature aging symptoms and cause acute mortality at higher doses in a range of organisms. Oxidative stress resistance and longevity are mechanistically and phenotypically linked; considerable variation in oxidative stress resistance exists among and within species and typically covaries with life expectancy. However, it is unclear whether stress-resistant, long-lived individuals avoid, repair, or tolerate molecular damage to survive longer than others. The honey bee (Apis mellifera L.) is an emerging model system that is well-suited to address this question. Furthermore, this species is the most economically important pollinator, whose health may be compromised by pesticide exposure, including oxidative stressors. Here, we develop a protocol for inducing oxidative stress in honey bee males (drones) via Paraquat injection. After injection, individuals from different colony sources were kept in common social conditions to monitor their survival compared to saline-injected controls. Oxidative stress was measured in susceptible and resistant individuals. Paraquat drastically reduced survival but individuals varied in their resistance to treatment within and among colony sources. Longer-lived individuals exhibited higher levels of lipid peroxidation than individuals dying early. In contrast, the level of protein carbonylation was not significantly different between the two groups. This first study of oxidative stress in male honey bees suggests that survival of an acute oxidative stressor is due to tolerance, not prevention or repair, of oxidative damage to lipids. It also demonstrates colony differences in oxidative stress resistance that might be useful for breeding stress-resistant honey bees.
authors.affiliation: Department of Entomology, North Carolina State University, Raleigh, NC, USA; W.M. Keck Center for Behavioral Biology, North Carolina State University, Raleigh, NC, USA; Department of Biology, University of North Carolina at Greensboro, Greensboro, NC, USA. Electronic address: hlibyar@ncsu.edu.
authors.forename: Hongmei
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Li-Byarlay
authors.affiliation: Eurofins Agroscience Services, Prospect Hill, NC, USA.
authors.forename: Ming Hua
authors.initials: MH
authors.lastname: Huang
authors.affiliation: Department of Entomology, North Carolina State University, Raleigh, NC, USA.
authors.forename: Michael
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Simone-Finstrom
authors.affiliation: Life Sciences Division, U.S. Army Research Office, Research Triangle Park, NC, USA.
authors.forename: Micheline K
authors.initials: MK
authors.lastname: Strand
authors.affiliation: Department of Entomology, North Carolina State University, Raleigh, NC, USA; W.M. Keck Center for Behavioral Biology, North Carolina State University, Raleigh, NC, USA.
authors.forename: David R
authors.initials: DR
authors.lastname: Tarpy
authors.affiliation: Department of Biology, University of North Carolina at Greensboro, Greensboro, NC, USA. Electronic address: olav_rueppell@uncg.edu.
authors.forename: Olav
authors.initials: O
authors.lastname: Rueppell
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D001516:Bees / Q000187:drug effects / Q000502:physiology*; D015227:Lipid Peroxidation; D008136:Longevity; D008297:Male; D018384:Oxidative Stress; D010269:Paraquat / Q000009:adverse effects
chemical_list: D010269:Paraquat