On Sun, Jul 7, 2013 at 11:12 PM, randy oliver <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

>
> What really surprises me about this study is that such a strong effect was
> claimed for differential gene expression in larvae, when in studies in
> which transmission of pesticide residues to larvae via jelly has been
> measured, the pesticide is virtually eliminated during conversion from
> beebread to jelly.  So there is really no telling as to whether the larvae
> were actually even exposed to the chemical.  However, it is perhaps
> plausible that the nurse bees changed the composition of the jelly, and
> that such a change affected larval gene expression.
>

Perhaps there is something here that explains the results which Dennis Van
Engelsdorp described to me one night, and which he said "made him
reconsider the role of neonicotinoids which he had pretty much
discounted....".  In that experiment the nurse bees which received a low
dose (non lethal) of imidacloprid did not show much effect.  But the cohort
of larva that they fed showed significant effect even though they never
were able to find any imidacloprid in that cohort of bees, only in the
nurse bees.

Stan

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