[Pollinator] Fwd: Electric Bees

Mon Feb 25 10:06:11 PST 2013

Thanks to Mary Clock Rust.

____________________________________
 From: Clock-Rust.Mary at epa.gov
To: LDA at pollinator.org
Sent: 2/25/2013  6:39:27 A.M. Pacific Standard Time
Subj: Electric Bees

_http://www.npr.org/2013/02/22/172611866/honey-its-electric-bees-sense-charg
e-on-flowers_ 
(http://www.npr.org/2013/02/22/172611866/honey-its-electric-bees-sense-charge-on-flowers)    
Honey, It's Electric: Bees Sense Charge On  Flowers 
by Adam  Cole 
February 22, 2013 3:27 AM  
February 22, 2013 
_Listen  to the Story_ 
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3 min 23 sec  
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(http://pd.npr.org/anon.npr-mp3/npr/me/2013/02/20130222_me_06.mp3?dl=1)    
    *   _Transcript_ (javascript:;) 
Flowers are nature's ad men. They'll do anything to attract the  attention 
of the pollinators that help them reproduce. That means spending  precious 
energy on bright pigments, enticing fragrances and dazzling  patterns. 
Now, scientists have found another element that contributes to  flowers' 
brand: their distinct electric field. 
Bumblebee Vision
Flowers taylor their displays toward the sensory capabilities of their  
pollinators. Bees can see visible and ultraviolet light, they have precise  
olfactory receptors, and now we know they can also detect electric  fields. 
    *   Visible  
    *   Ultraviolet  
    *   Fragrance  
    *   Electric

Visible spectrum. Certain bright colors and petal shapes attract certain  
pollinators. 
_Kevin  Collins_ (http://www.facebook.com/KevinCollinsPhotography)   
_Enlarge  image_ 
(http://www.npr.org/2013/02/22/172611866/honey-its-electric-bees-sense-charge-on-flowers)  _i_ 
(http://www.npr.org/2013/02/22/172611866/honey-its-electric-bees-sense-charge-on-flowers)    
Ultraviolet (false color). Bees and other pollinators can see the 
ultraviolet end of the  spectrum. They are guided by patterns on flowers that are 
invisible to  humans. 
_Kevin  Collins_ (http://www.facebook.com/KevinCollinsPhotography)   

Ultraviolet (false color). Bees and other pollinators can see the 
ultraviolet end of the  spectrum. They are guided by patterns on flowers that are 
invisible to  humans. 
_Kevin  Collins_ (http://www.facebook.com/KevinCollinsPhotography)   

Fragrance plume (artist's depiction). Bees follow specific odors to locate 
flowers and, once they arrive,  use scent maps to move toward the center of 
the flower. Fragrance that clings  to a bee provides information for other 
bees back at the  hive. 
Adam Cole/NPR  

Electric field (artist's depiction). Flowers have a weak negative electric 
charge relative to the air  around them. Different flowers have different 
electric fields, often with  charge concentrated at the tips of the petals. 
Adam Cole/NPR  
Anne Leonard, who studies bees at the University of Nevada, says our  
understanding of pollinator-flower communication has been expanding for  decades. 
"Flowers do a lot of things you might not expect," Leonard says. "We  
observe they have these distinct bright, beautiful colors, patterns,  scents." 
But we don't often stop to consider that this incredible display is  all an 
attempt to attract bees and other pollinators. These displays don't  just 
consist of things humans notice. There are also patterns in the  ultraviolet 
spectrum, petal temperatures and textures and  shapes. 
"We've found that by producing these combinations of sensory stimuli,  the 
plant basically makes its flowers easier for the bee to learn and  
remember," Leonard says. 
That means the bee can forage more efficiently, and flowers are more  
likely to be pollinated. 
"This is a magnificent interaction where you have an animal and a  plant, 
and they both want this to go as well as possible," says Gregory Sutton  of 
the University of Bristol in the U.K. "The flowers are trying to make  
themselves look as different as possible. This is to establish the flower's  
brand." 
Sutton and a team of researchers led by Daniel Robert have just  uncovered 
a whole new layer to flower brands. 
"We found that flowers can use electric fields," Sutton  says. 
That's right — electric fields. It turns out flowers have a slight  
negative charge relative to the air around them. Bumblebees have a charge,  too. 
"When bees are flying through the air, just the friction of the air  and 
the friction of the body parts on one another causes the bee to become  
positively charged," Sutton says. 
It's like shuffling across a carpet in wool socks. When a positively  
charged bee lands on a flower, the negatively charged pollen grains naturally  
stick to it. The Bristol team wondered if bees were aware of this  
electrostatic interaction. 
So, they designed an experiment — one described in this week's _Science_ 
(http://www.sciencemag.org/)   magazine. The researchers built a small arena 
full of fake flowers. Each  flower was simple — a stalk with a small steel 
dish at the top. Half of the  "flowers" held delicious sugar water. The other 
half held quinine, a substance  that bees find bitter and disgusting. 
When bumblebees explored this false flower patch, they moved around  
randomly. They chose to land on sweet flowers just about as often as bitter  
flowers. 
But when the sweet flowers carried a small charge, the bees learned  pretty 
quickly to choose the charged flowers. And when the electric charge was  
removed? They went back to their random foraging. 
The bees had recognized the electric field, and had learned to use it  to 
find sweet flowers. But that's not all. 
"In the seconds just before the bee lands, there is electrical  activity in 
the plant," Sutton says. 
The plant's electric field is changed by the proximity of that  positively 
charged bee. And once the bee leaves, the field stays changed for  100 
seconds or so. That's long enough for the altered field to serve as a  warning 
for the next bee that buzzes by. She won't stop to investigate a  flower 
that's already been visited. 

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