title: First confirmed report of a bacterial brood disease in stingless bees.
abstract: Susceptibility to brood pathogens in eusocial stingless bees (Meliponini), alternative pollinators to honey bees, is unknown. Brood losses in managed colonies of the Australian stingless bee, Tetragonula carbonaria, were studied over 20months. We isolated a disease-causing bacterium, Lysinibacillus sphaericus (Firmicutes, Bacillaceae), from worker and queen larvae, brood cell provisions and honey stores. Pathogenicity experiments confirmed this bacterium as the causal organism. It took 22days from infection to first appearance of brood disease symptoms. This is the first confirmed record of a brood pathogen in stingless bees.
authors.affiliation: School of Science and Health, Western Sydney University, Locked Bag 1797, Penrith, NSW 2751, Australia; Plant Health Australia, Phipps Close, Deakin, ACT 2600, Australia.
authors.forename: Jenny Lee
authors.initials: JL
authors.lastname: Shanks
authors.affiliation: School of Science and Health, Western Sydney University, Locked Bag 1797, Penrith, NSW 2751, Australia.
authors.forename: Anthony Mark
authors.initials: AM
authors.lastname: Haigh
authors.affiliation: Hawkesbury Institute for the Environment, Western Sydney University, Locked Bag 1797, Penrith, NSW 2751, Australia.
authors.forename: Markus
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Riegler
authors.affiliation: School of Science and Health, Western Sydney University, Locked Bag 1797, Penrith, NSW 2751, Australia; Hawkesbury Institute for the Environment, Western Sydney University, Locked Bag 1797, Penrith, NSW 2751, Australia. Electronic address: r.spooner-hart@uws.edu.au.
authors.forename: Robert Neil
authors.initials: RN
authors.lastname: Spooner-Hart
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D001315:Australia; D001516:Bees / Q000382:microbiology*; D056631:Colony Collapse / Q000382:microbiology*; D000068536:Bacillota
keywords: Brood disease; Honey bee; Lysinibacillus sphaericus; Tetragonula carbonaria