>>>>>Peter said "If this is boring...<<<<
Far from it.
>>>>>Gavin states that he is a geneticist and says:  "There are complex  controls 
over the expression of most genes,,,it is just that now we are getting  some 
idea of just how complex."<<<<<

For my money this is the understatement of the year. Epigenetics is turning the study of evolution and adaptation on its' ear.
    There are two separate items .1.The effects of nutrition on the developing bee. 2. The effects of nutrition/stress on the genome of said bee.
    Gene expression is not only affected by diet. Trauma or triumph can affect the gene.
    One (epigenetic) study I read was based on a population of starved people in Holland during WW-2. Children were born with low birth weight. Their children were born with low birth weight. And the trait was passed on (I think) to the next generation. Lower birth weight can be good or bad. Smaller people eat less but smaller babies have lower survival rates. I looked for the study and couldn’t find it. These will tide you over until I do.
http://www.geneticsandhealth.com/2008/10/30/maternal-starvation-has-lasting-effect-on-fetus-dna/

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/health/article1759971.ece

My limited understanding tells me that the ramifications of epigenetics will have resounding effects on bee and other breeding.  In fact it already has and we are just finding out about it. It increases by a hundredfold the adaptive ability of a species.
Peter wrote:
>>>>
So imagine, if you will, if behaviors can be regulated through substances introduced into the diet and if changes these can be passed on via heredity. 
>>>>>
Genetically endowed behaviors and other genetic expressions can be regulated through substances; through trauma and through whatever in the environment has an impact. It isn’t so much that we can find the switches…it’s that this fact of life has been going on forever. We are at the point of beginning to understand it. 
     Considering the effects of trauma on genes, it may not make as much sense to "breed from the survivors." The thought also occurs that a worker bee is also a starved queen. Could this adaptation have settled in, this way, in a few generations? Is there something here we should know about "small-cell" bees? My head hurts.

Dick Marron
 

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