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The geometric framework for nutrition reveals interactions between protein and carbohydrate during larval growth in honey bees

In holometabolous insects, larval nutrition affects adult body size, a life history trait with a profound influence on performance and fitness. Individual nutritional components of larval diets are often complex and may interact with one another, necessitating the use of a geometric framework for el...

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Autores principales: Helm, Bryan R., Slater, Garett P., Rajamohan, Arun, Yocum, George D., Greenlee, Kendra J., Bowsher, Julia H.
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: The Company of Biologists Ltd 2017
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5483014/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28396492
http://dx.doi.org/10.1242/bio.022582
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author Helm, Bryan R.
Slater, Garett P.
Rajamohan, Arun
Yocum, George D.
Greenlee, Kendra J.
Bowsher, Julia H.
author_facet Helm, Bryan R.
Slater, Garett P.
Rajamohan, Arun
Yocum, George D.
Greenlee, Kendra J.
Bowsher, Julia H.
author_sort Helm, Bryan R.
collection PubMed
description In holometabolous insects, larval nutrition affects adult body size, a life history trait with a profound influence on performance and fitness. Individual nutritional components of larval diets are often complex and may interact with one another, necessitating the use of a geometric framework for elucidating nutritional effects. In the honey bee, Apis mellifera, nurse bees provision food to developing larvae, directly moderating growth rates and caste development. However, the eusocial nature of honey bees makes nutritional studies challenging, because diet components cannot be systematically manipulated in the hive. Using in vitro rearing, we investigated the roles and interactions between carbohydrate and protein content on larval survival, growth, and development in A. mellifera. We applied a geometric framework to determine how these two nutritional components interact across nine artificial diets. Honey bees successfully completed larval development under a wide range of protein and carbohydrate contents, with the medium protein (∼5%) diet having the highest survival. Protein and carbohydrate both had significant and non-linear effects on growth rate, with the highest growth rates observed on a medium-protein, low-carbohydrate diet. Diet composition did not have a statistically significant effect on development time. These results confirm previous findings that protein and carbohydrate content affect the growth of A. mellifera larvae. However, this study identified an interaction between carbohydrate and protein content that indicates a low-protein, high-carb diet has a negative effect on larval growth and survival. These results imply that worker recruitment in the hive would decline under low protein conditions, even when nectar abundance or honey stores are sufficient.
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spelling pubmed-54830142017-06-28 The geometric framework for nutrition reveals interactions between protein and carbohydrate during larval growth in honey bees Helm, Bryan R. Slater, Garett P. Rajamohan, Arun Yocum, George D. Greenlee, Kendra J. Bowsher, Julia H. Biol Open Research Article In holometabolous insects, larval nutrition affects adult body size, a life history trait with a profound influence on performance and fitness. Individual nutritional components of larval diets are often complex and may interact with one another, necessitating the use of a geometric framework for elucidating nutritional effects. In the honey bee, Apis mellifera, nurse bees provision food to developing larvae, directly moderating growth rates and caste development. However, the eusocial nature of honey bees makes nutritional studies challenging, because diet components cannot be systematically manipulated in the hive. Using in vitro rearing, we investigated the roles and interactions between carbohydrate and protein content on larval survival, growth, and development in A. mellifera. We applied a geometric framework to determine how these two nutritional components interact across nine artificial diets. Honey bees successfully completed larval development under a wide range of protein and carbohydrate contents, with the medium protein (∼5%) diet having the highest survival. Protein and carbohydrate both had significant and non-linear effects on growth rate, with the highest growth rates observed on a medium-protein, low-carbohydrate diet. Diet composition did not have a statistically significant effect on development time. These results confirm previous findings that protein and carbohydrate content affect the growth of A. mellifera larvae. However, this study identified an interaction between carbohydrate and protein content that indicates a low-protein, high-carb diet has a negative effect on larval growth and survival. These results imply that worker recruitment in the hive would decline under low protein conditions, even when nectar abundance or honey stores are sufficient. The Company of Biologists Ltd 2017-04-10 /pmc/articles/PMC5483014/ /pubmed/28396492 http://dx.doi.org/10.1242/bio.022582 Text en © 2017. Published by The Company of Biologists Ltd http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution and reproduction in any medium provided that the original work is properly attributed.
spellingShingle Research Article
Helm, Bryan R.
Slater, Garett P.
Rajamohan, Arun
Yocum, George D.
Greenlee, Kendra J.
Bowsher, Julia H.
The geometric framework for nutrition reveals interactions between protein and carbohydrate during larval growth in honey bees
title The geometric framework for nutrition reveals interactions between protein and carbohydrate during larval growth in honey bees
title_full The geometric framework for nutrition reveals interactions between protein and carbohydrate during larval growth in honey bees
title_fullStr The geometric framework for nutrition reveals interactions between protein and carbohydrate during larval growth in honey bees
title_full_unstemmed The geometric framework for nutrition reveals interactions between protein and carbohydrate during larval growth in honey bees
title_short The geometric framework for nutrition reveals interactions between protein and carbohydrate during larval growth in honey bees
title_sort geometric framework for nutrition reveals interactions between protein and carbohydrate during larval growth in honey bees
topic Research Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5483014/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28396492
http://dx.doi.org/10.1242/bio.022582
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