title: The Phenotypic Effects of Royal Jelly on Wild-Type D. melanogaster Are Strain-Specific.
abstract: The role for royal jelly (RJ) in promoting caste differentiation of honeybee larvae into queens rather than workers is well characterized. A recent study demonstrated that this poorly understood complex nutrition drives strikingly similar phenotypic effects in Drosophila melanogaster, such as increased body size and reduced developmental time, making possible the use of D. melanogaster as a model system for the genetic analysis of the cellular mechanisms underlying RJ and caste differentiation. We demonstrate here that RJ increases the body size of some wild-type strains of D. melanogaster but not others, and report significant delays in developmental time in all flies reared on RJ. These findings suggest that cryptic genetic variation may be a factor in the D. melanogaster response to RJ, and should be considered when attempting to elucidate response mechanisms to environmental changes in non-honeybee species.
authors.affiliation: Department of Dermatology, Program in Epithelial Biology, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, CA, 94305, United States of America.|Program in Cancer Biology, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, CA, 94305, United States of America.
authors.forename: Stefanie L
authors.initials: SL
authors.lastname: Morgan
authors.affiliation: Department of Biological Sciences, Bridgewater State University, Bridgewater, MA, 02325, United States of America.
authors.forename: Joseph A
authors.initials: JA
authors.lastname: Seggio
authors.affiliation: Department of Biological Sciences, Bridgewater State University, Bridgewater, MA, 02325, United States of America.
authors.forename: Nara F
authors.initials: NF
authors.lastname: Nascimento
authors.affiliation: Department of Dermatology, Program in Epithelial Biology, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, CA, 94305, United States of America.
authors.forename: Dana D
authors.initials: DD
authors.lastname: Huh
authors.affiliation: Department of Biological Sciences, Bridgewater State University, Bridgewater, MA, 02325, United States of America.
authors.forename: Jasmin A
authors.initials: JA
authors.lastname: Hicks
authors.affiliation: Department of Pathology, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, CA, 94305, United States of America.|Department of Genetics, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, CA, 94305, United States of America.
authors.forename: Katherine A
authors.initials: KA
authors.lastname: Sharp
authors.affiliation: Department of Pathology, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, CA, 94305, United States of America.
authors.forename: Jeffrey D
authors.initials: JD
authors.lastname: Axelrod
authors.affiliation: Department of Dermatology, Program in Epithelial Biology, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, CA, 94305, United States of America.|Program in Cancer Biology, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, CA, 94305, United States of America.|Veterans Affairs Healthcare System, Palo Alto, CA, 94304, United States of America.
authors.forename: Kevin C
authors.initials: KC
authors.lastname: Wang
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D049628:Body Size / Q000187:drug effects*; D004305:Dose-Response Relationship, Drug; D004331:Drosophila melanogaster / Q000187:drug effects / Q000235:genetics / Q000254:growth & development*; D005227:Fatty Acids / Q000494:pharmacology*; D005260:Female; D014644:Genetic Variation; D008297:Male; D010641:Phenotype; D000099219:Royal Jelly
chemical_list: D005227:Fatty Acids; D000099219:Royal Jelly