Thanks Peter. I hope people are researching the relatedness/fylogeny of the Nosema strains. Or are at least generating data on multiple infections IF there are really seperate strains.
We might be witnessing a speciation event. The relatedness and competion of different "strains" for bees and our response (affecting bee diverisity and pathogen transmission) will affect the long term virulence of the disease.
Too much for this email, I am at work but there is some good modeling out there (look for " dynamics of multiple infection and the evolution of virulence" by Van Baalen and Sabelis or related work) that might give a testable case for the Nosema species and maybe we can make some predictions.
L
_________________________________________________________________
Express yourself instantly with MSN Messenger! Download today it's FREE!
http://messenger.msn.click-url.com/go/onm00200471ave/direct/01/
*******************************************************
* Search the BEE-L archives at: *
* http://listserv.albany.edu:8080/cgi-bin/wa?S1=bee-l *
*******************************************************