> The experiments reported here were conducted in order to (1) determine if the odor of amino acids is detectable to honeybees (Apis mellifera), and (2) determine olfactory detection thresholds in honeybees for detectable amino acid odors. 

> One class of odorants that has never been tested with honeybees so far are the amino acids. This is surprising given that free amino acids are the second most abundant group of compounds in nectar after carbohydrates, and given that the behavior of honeybees suggests that they prefer nectar containing amino acids over solutions containing only sucrose

>To my knowledge, this study is the first to examine whether Apis mellifera (the European honeybee) is able to detect the odor of amino acids. The results demonstrate that honeybees can significantly detect five out of 20 amino acids presented at 100 mM. These five amino acids were detected at median olfactory detection thresholds as low as 12.5 mM with L-tyrosine and L-cysteine, 50 mM with L-tryptophan and L-asparagine, and 100 mM with L-proline.

Olfactory detectability of amino acids in the European honeybee (Apis mellifera)
Nellie Linander
Department of Physics, Chemistry and Biology
Linköpings universitet
SE-581 83 Linköping, Sweden
             ***********************************************
The BEE-L mailing list is powered by L-Soft's renowned
LISTSERV(R) list management software.  For more information, go to:
http://www.lsoft.com/LISTSERV-powered.html

Guidelines for posting to BEE-L can be found at:
http://honeybeeworld.com/bee-l/guidelines.htm