#Deformed Wing Virus

[kentuckypollinatorresearch]

Want to learn about honey bees? The Varroa destructor mite is a key factor in causing colonies to collapse. These mites lower bee immune responses, act as biological vectors for pathogens, and replicate viruses, increasing the risk of colonies failing. This graphic shows how Varroa move within a colony.

Nurse bees are caretakers for upcoming generations. Nurses and the brood anatomically have larger fat bodies (an organ critical for immune system function). Varroa will climb off the adult nurse bees, into the brood cells, where they will parasitize them, vector viruses all while female mites reproduce within the cells. With mites carrying high viral infection levels, they are likely to carry a variant of Deformed Wing Virus which can have obvious and deadly symptoms.

Graphic from: Mondet et al., “Honey Bee Survival Mechanisms against the Parasite Varroa Destructor: A Systematic Review of Phenotypic and Genomic Research Efforts.”

[dandyonmain]

Princess Vanya of the White Peonies A character I’ve made for an upcoming hollow knight themed pathfinder campaign I’m super excited to be a part of. She’s themed after a Russian queen bee but was rejected from her hive before she could take her place. Now she’s traveling the world doing her best to hide the deformed, usless wings that made her unfit to be a queen in her hive’s eyes while keeping a positive and optimistic attitude. She’s roughly inspired by princess Zelda and I am so excited to play her!

[milkdongcomics]

World Bee Day 2024 世界蜜蜂日 ANIMAN - SICK BEE HEY HUMAN, SEE WHAT YOU DO!? Pre-order: https://a.co/d/6SrfkMf Instagram:  milkdongcomics Facebook:  Milk DoNg Comics

[pnwnativeplants]

https://www.xerces.org/blog/want-to-save-bees-focus-on-habitat-not-honey-bees

Five reasons why honey bees can be a problem

Native plants need native bees. Native bees coevolved with our native plants and often have behavioral adaptations that make them better pollinators than honey bees. For example, buzz-pollination, in which a bee grasps a flower and shakes the pollen loose, is a behavior at which bumble bees and other large-bodied native bees excel, and one that honey bees lack.

Honey bees are sub-par pollinators. The way that honey bees interact with flowers means that they sometimes contribute little or nothing to pollination. Honey bees groom their pollen and carry it in neat pollen cakes, where it’s less likely to contact the stigma of another flower and pollinate it. They are also known “nectar robbers” of many plants, accessing their nectar in a way that means they don’t touch the pollen, often by biting a hole in the base of the flower. By contrast, many of our native bees tend to be messier, carrying pollen as dry grains, often all over their bodies where it’s more likely to pollinate the plant.

Hungry hives crowd out native pollinators. Introducing a single honey bee hive means 15,000 to 50,000 additional mouths to feed in an area that may already lack sufficient flowering resources. This increases competition with our native bees and raises the energy costs of foraging, which can be significant. One study calculated that over a period of three months, a single hive collects as much pollen as could support the development of 100,000 native solitary bees!

Honey bees can spread disease. Unfortunately, honey bees can spread diseases to our native bees—deformed wing virus, for example, can be passed from honey bees to bumble bees—and can also amplify and distribute diseases within a bee community. 

Urban honey bee hive densities are often too high. There is growing evidence of negative impacts in towns and cities from the presence of honey bees. A recent study from Montreal showed that the number of species of native bees found in an area decreased when the number of honey bees went up. In Britain, the London Beekeepers Association found that some parts of that city had four times as many hives as the city’s gardens and parks could support. The conservation organization Buglife recommends creating two hectares (five acres) of habitat for each hive, several times the size of an average residential lot in the United States.

[ashcoveredtraveler]

Headcannon Dumping (2)

Soul Master likes jewelry, especially circlets. While all of the other bugs in the city wear wigs, he wears a crown for himself to signify how important he views himself.

Intersex Quirrel. I really like the idea of him having a pouch to carry young kids as female pillbugs have them in real life. But since I already made Traitor Lord trans(and if I were to make another character trans, I would make them mtf), I decided to just make Quirrel intersex, having him possess only a few female features.

Hive Knight can't fly due to having a Deformed Wing Virus (DWV), which is an actual virus that affects bees. This may be canon as he doesn't have wings in-game. But what isn't canon is that Herrah made Hive Knight multiple cloaks with wing-like imagery, which made him more beautiful than all of the other bees with wings.

Vessels do not need to eat to survive but they do need nutrients to grow and develop. They have mouths hidden under the bottom of their shell. However, I would like to think that their mouths are horrifying. I would also like to think they have a double mouth like an Xenomorph from the Alien franchise. (The image below is the mouth in question):

Wyrms can grow fur depending on where they live, kinda like how animals grow and lose their fur depending on the season. However, you wouldn't be able to see these as the fur grows between their scales and is hidden away most of the time. This allows pockets of heat to be stored away so it doesn't get messy from all of the dirt it has to tunnel through. Vessels also grow fur, but it really depends on the amount of nutrients they get and the environment they grow up in.

This ties into the last point, but White Lady can grow fur or fuzz. I imagine it would feel like poison ivy. I would imagine that when the vessel grows this, it would initially be difficult to tell if it was fur or plant fuzz. But when maintaining the vessel's fuzz/fur, the retainer's hands and arms would get itchy, meaning that the vessel can be poisonous.

I kinda mentioned this in the knight's backstory, specifically for Isma's backstory, but she was born in a "communal family unit", or a household with multiple parents. Polyamory is common within Greenpath, though there isn't a head of the household, and consists of multiple types of parents instead of a father and multiple wives.

Manti are the Germans of the bug world. They speak so aggressively but they could be talking about the most normal stuff.(I know in my language headcanon I say that their language would sound like Afrikaans, but I am saying German as I see memes about it more often.)

Sorry if this post was a bit shorter than the first headcanon post. This has been in my drafts longer than I would like. I am also currently in a different country for a week for a spring break class. That means I don't have constant WiFi and am at the mercy of the hostel WiFi's. So might as well post something.

[opheliajupiter99]

MLP Broodmother Virus: Virus Variation

(An extra bit of juicy tidbits before we get into more story/art)

Pegasus Symptom Variant:

Rapid Feather Loss

Heightened Muscle Density at Core of Wing

Notes: At Stage 4 for Pegasi, this begins. Oddly enough, despite the feather loss, the wing itself (IE the bone and muscle of the wing) appears to be growing stronger. Why this is happening is currently unknown, as feather loss should prevent flight, so why would the wing need to be stronger?

Unicorn Symptom Variant:

Horn Deformation

Magic Corruption

Notes: At Stage 4 for Unicorns, this begins. The horn begins to crack and twist painfully, and the magic within becomes corrupted and unstable, making casting spells very risky. Unsettlingly, the tainted horn's structure and density more closely resembles a Changeling's horn than a pony's horn at this point.

Extra Notes:

The Enlightened, as the resident scientists/doctors of Twilight's facility have begun to call them, seem to avoid infecting certain ponies, namely the sick, the elderly, and children. This doesn't appear to be for any moral reason; instead, it appears to be due to the larvae putting a great enough strain on the host, between feeding off of their nutrients and their growth during gestation, that a weakened host would likely die before the larvae are fully grown. However, this does not mean that they are unwilling to harm members of these groups if they get in their way, they will simply avoid infecting them.

Additionally, larvae have been documented releasing a chemical in certain hosts currently nicknamed 'Failsafe', which causes rapid cell death. It is called 'Failsafe' due to the fact the larvae seem to only release this chemical upon 'unworthy' hosts, hosts that rebel against the virus's built-in desires to aid and nurture the Copycats.

[t4tdexter]

oh you like cas and bees? write him having an in-character reaction to the varroa mite infesting his hives. mr cutesie bug lover would destroy every hemolin sucker in the whole tri state area costing the lives of thousands of drone brood. not to mention how he’d panic if he saw one (1) instance of deformed wing virus. i think it’d give him a psychological breakdown and he’d have to temporarily board his hives with someone else for his mental health and then kill them bc his population dropped by 5% in transit

[michaelmilligan]

Endversetober Day 13: Night

(explanation post) (compilation post - now with AO3 link)

A strand of long hair fell into Raphael's face as another zombie succumbed, screeching, to their grace. The spatter of blood barely even registered with them anymore as they let go of the – now all the way – dead body and let it slump to the ground.

With all the grace they were using, Raphael's mastery of the vessel was slipping, and they took heaving breaths to spare themself the energy to keep it going without air in its lungs.

Having caught their vessel's breath, Raphael huffed and flicked the hair out of their face.

“Slow going, huh?” a voice suddenly asked behind them, and they whirled around, angel blade at the ready.

“Relax, Raphie. I'm not here to fight.”

It took about half a second for Raphael to recognize Gabriel behind that shaggy hair and the overly innocent expression. They didn't lower their blade, though.

“And who says I don't want to fight?” they asked, even as their vessel's hair slipped from behind their ear and over their face again.

Gabriel raised an eyebrow. “Tough day?”

For one frustrated moment, Raphael seriously thought about stabbing him.

Then they stowed their angel blade and fixed their hair again. “You have no idea.”

Gabriel snorted. “Try me.”

Right. Gabriel had been down here the whole time, witnessing the plague. The apocalypse.

Well, at least he didn't have to follow Michael's more and more desperate orders the last few hundred years.

“Let me guess: You don't have Michael's lance,” Raphael said, making Gabriel roll his eyes.

“Why does everyone ask me that? No, I don't have the stupid lance. I don't need a big bad stabbing weapon, my dick is large enough.”

Raphael just blinked at him, not sure they wanted to know what this was about. When Gabriel (thankfully) didn't elaborate, they said: “Balthazar accused you, but I figured he was either just theorizing or trying to shift the blame from himself to someone else. What easier target than someone who isn't there to defend himself?”

“Easy target, huh? Gotta say, no one's called me that since Luci moved downstairs.”

Casually, Gabriel moved so he could look past Raphael, at the mangled corpse of what must once have been a human, though its soul, such that it had still existed a minute ago, held little resemblance to one.

For a long moment, Gabriel seemed to contemplate the carnage that Raphael had wrought on the creatures in this city. Not that they regretted it – these zombies were a perversion of their Father's creation, like any other monster. They weren't quite demonic, but Raphael thought that given enough time, their torment would twist them far enough to pass, if not as their siblings, at least as the demons' cousins.

There were only so many ways a soul could be deformed.

“Heard you were hard at work cleaning this place out,” Gabriel said, the hands of his vessel stuffed into the pockets of his pants. But while his vessel seemed calm, the set of his wings betrayed an underlying tension. “Is that what you're doing?”

Raphael noticed there was blood on their hand, which meant it must be on their face, too, where they'd fixed their hair. Not that it mattered. They could have vanished it with a thought.

They left it, though.

“I was trying to see if...” Suddenly, the whole affair seemed ridiculous. Trying to heal a virus that had no doubt been crafted over years, if not centuries, all on their own? In the few weeks, or days, until Michael would deem that they'd waited long enough and would reset the timeline?

“See what?” Gabriel asked, tone carefully neutral.

Raphael looked up at the sky. “If any of this can still be salvaged.”

They were both silent for a moment.

Then, Gabriel said lowly, almost in a whisper: “You're trying to heal them.”

“You can see how successful that's been.” Bitterly, Raphael gestured to the blood bath around them. “I haven't even come close. Not once.”

It was pointless.

“Well you're not going to get there if you stop now.” Slowly, Gabriel stepped up to Raphael until he stood right in front of them.

A part of Raphael screamed to reach for their angel blade, but instead they just raised their head. Gabriel's vessel and their own were roughly the same height, so light brown eyes met slightly darker, hazel ones straight on.

“I'm tired, Gabriel,” they said.

“I know.” For a moment, Gabriel's wings drooped – but he quickly caught himself, straightening them. “But someone has to try to make this right.”

“For what? We'll reset this timeline anyway.” This was the second time Raphael had told someone who shouldn't know. If Michael ever found out, there would be consequences.

They couldn't bring themself to care anymore.

“Damn. I kinda figured Mikey had something up his sleeve, but...” The frown on Gabriel's face soon morphed into determination. “When is he gonna do it?”

“There's no set date yet, but it can't take long anymore. He's getting more and more frustrated.”

“So we don't have much time. If we still want to make a change, we have to be quick.” Gabriel's eyes gleamed almost maniacally – and not just those of his vessel.

“Change what? It doesn't matter anyway.”

“It does to the people here! If we can still give them hope... “

“Then soon, they won't remember it.”

“Well, they'll feel it now!”

Gabriel's insistence came only partly as a surprise. He'd always been purpose-driven, much like Michael, though usually for different purposes.

Raphael looked at their brother for a long moment, then let their gaze settle on a dead zombie again.

“I'll need more of them,” they said eventually.

Despite everything, despite the hundred of years they had spent apart, despite all the anger and the hate... Gabriel grinned. “On it.”

[entomoblog]

Virus de l'aile déformée (DWV, Deformed wing virus) : comment les virus exploitent les acariens et ciblent l'abeille

See on Scoop.it - EntomoNews

Susceptible and infectious states for both vector and host in a dynamic pathogen–vector–host system

  Zachary S. Lamas et al.

Published:10 January 2024

  Royal Society Open Science

  [Image] Model of DWV circulation among worker bees and Varroa. Red arrows represent vectoring of DWV to bees or acquisition of DWV to Varroa via infectious bees. Blue arrows represent circulation of DWV through trophallaxis. Black arrow represents infection from cannibalization. Complex transmission dynamics theoretically supports social behaviours maintaining pathogen for subsequent vector acquisition.

  [Varroa destructor / Apis mellifera]

  -------

NDÉ

Traduction (d'après DeepL)

  Le virus de l'aile déformée (DWV) est un pathogène récurrent de l'abeille mellifère qui est activement transmis par des vecteurs et par contact social chez l'hôte.

  La transmission continue du DWV entre les hôtes et les vecteurs est nécessaire pour maintenir le pathogène au sein de la population, et ce système vecteur-hôte-pathogène offre une dynamique unique de transmission de la maladie pour le maintien du pathogène entre les vecteurs et un hôte social.

  Dans une série d'expériences, nous avons mesuré les voies de transmission vecteur-vecteur, hôte-hôte et hôte-vecteur et montré comment elles maintiennent le DWV dans les populations d'abeilles.

  Nous avons constaté que les co-infestations sur des hôtes partagés permettaient le déplacement du DWV d'un acarien à l'autre.

  En outre, deux comportements sociaux de l'abeille, la trophallaxie et la cannibalisation des pupes, constituent des voies de transmission horizontale d'une abeille à l'autre. La circulation du virus uniquement entre les hôtes par le biais de modes transmissibles constitue un réservoir de DWV que les varroas non infectés peuvent acquérir ; ils peuvent ensuite transmettre l'agent pathogène.

  Nos résultats illustrent l'importance de la transmission communautaire entre les hôtes et la transmission vectorielle.

  Nous utilisons ces résultats pour mettre en évidence les voies clés utilisées par le DWV au cours de son maintien et de son infection et soulignons les similitudes avec une série d'autres maladies infectieuses d'importance zoonotique et médicale.

  [Titre du scoop] d'après Jay Evans sur X, 10.01.2024

https://twitter.com/JayDEvans88/status/1745065545718763887

  "He has left the Musk Hotel but nice work by @zaclamas describing how viruses exploit mites and target @honeybees, ..."

  Bernadette Cassel's insight:

  'Virus de l'aile déformée / DWV Deformed wing virus' in EntomoNews → 11 scoops https://www.scoop.it/topic/entomonews/?&tag=Virus+de+l%27aile+d%C3%A9form%C3%A9e+%2F+DWV+Deformed+wing+virus

[scientificinquirer-blog]

Research on bee virus origins uncovers buzz-worthy breakthrough.

European honey bees are the most common bee species used to produce honey globally. They have larger colonies compared to other bee species, produce more honey, are less aggressive, and excellent foragers.  The spread of Deformed wing viruses (DWV) is one of the most important drivers in the decline in European honey bee populations worldwide. These viruses cause wing abnormalities and affect…

[tsmom1219]

Varroa mites and deformed wing virus make honeybees more susceptible to insecticides

Read the full story from the Agricultural Research Service. Controlling for Varroa mites, the parasitic mites that feed on honey bees and serve as vectors for viral diseases like deformed wing virus (DWV), can help with improving honeybee populations and make bees less susceptible to harmful insecticides, according to a recent study published in Environmental Pollution.

[evoldir]

Fwd: Graduate position: UUlm.BeeVirusEvolution

Begin forwarded message: > From: evoldir@evol.biology.mcmaster.ca > Subject: Graduate position: UUlm.BeeVirusEvolution > Date: 24 February 2023 at 06:31:40 GMT > To: rdmpage@gmail.com > > > University of Ulm, Germany > > Institute of Evolutionary Ecology and Conservation Genomics > > Wilfert group > > This 3-year PhD is part of the ERC consolidator grant BeePath to > Prof. Lena Wilfert, studying how the acquisition of vector-borne > transmission has impacted the epidemiology and evolution of an important > bee pathogen, Deformed Wing Virus. The project integrates evolution > in natural populations of honeybees and bumblebees with experimental > viral evolution in the lab, fitness assays in the virus and its hosts > and modelling to understand the ultimate drivers of pathogen and host > fitness. The project team includes two post-docs and labwork is supported > by an experienced technician dedicated to this project. This position > will focus on understanding the links between virus evolution and host > fitness. It will include experimental infections and evolution using > bee viruses, molecular evolution and modelling of host and pathogen > fitness/health. The ERC-funded post is for 3 years (salary scale TV-L 13, > 65%), with a preferred starting date in summer 2023. > > Applicants will possess a relevant master's degree in a related field > of study. Ideally, the successful applicant should have expertise in > host-pathogen interactions, molecular ecology or evolution. Experience in > working with bees or insects as well as with bioinformatics and modelling > approaches would be desirable. The successful applicant will be able to > work autonomously but also collaboratively, and will have excellent oral > and written English language skills. Expertise or an interest in working > with our collaborator Prof. Mike Boots (UC Berkeley) on mathematical > models would be welcome. > > The position will be based at the University of Ulm, at the Institute > of Evolutionary Ecology and Conservation Genomics. Ulm is a delightful > historic city on the Danube in Southwestern Germany; it is one hour > from the Alps, Lake Constance, Munich and Stuttgart. Additionally, > the position offers the potential for an extended stay at UC Berkeley. > > For further information, please contact Prof. Lena Wilfert > lena.wilfert@uni-ulm.de. The closing date is the 2nd of April 2023. > > The job advert with detailed information on profile and responsibilities, > as well as the link to the online application system, can be found at > https://ift.tt/wXPz40n > > Please note that applications have to be processed online! > > > > Lena Wilfert

[beekeepingfiji]

Honeybee lifespan could be half what it was 50 years ago – new study

New Post has been published on https://www.beekeepingfiji.com/?p=4436

Honeybee lifespan could be half what it was 50 years ago – new study

A new paper shows how the lifespan of the adult honeybee appears to have shrunk by nearly 50% in the past 50 years. The European Red List for Bees suggests nearly one in ten species of wild bees are facing extinction. Imagine how we would react if human lifespans halved. The equivalent would be if the average woman in the UK  was living to 41 instead of 82 years old.

Our future is intertwined with bees. Without bees and other pollinators, we cannot grow the majority of crops we depend on for food.

This research could help explain the high levels of bee colony deaths around the world over the past few decades. Bee deaths were particularly severe in the USA in the winter of 2006-7, when some commercial beekeepers lost 90% of their colonies.

Unexplained high rates of bee colony deaths have also been reported in Canada, Australia, Belgium, France, the Netherlands, Greece, Italy, Portugal, Spain, Switzerland, Germany, Finland and Poland. In the cold winter of 2012-13, 29% of honeybee colonies in the UK died.

50 years of data

The authors, Anthony Nearman and Dennis van Engelsdorp from University of Maryland, used mathematical modelling to show lower bee life expectancy could lead to mass colony death. According to their study, since 1969, honeybee life span in the US has dropped from a median of 34 days to just 18 days.

The authors studied worker bees removed from hives and kept in cages, not wild bees, which may have affected their results. But if not, something really worrying is going on.

The authors believe modern honeybees may be suffering from higher prevalence of disease such as deformed wing virus, which has become more common since its discovery 40 years ago, due to the global spread of its vector, the varroa mite. Modern bees may be weakened by new generations of pesticides that did not exist 50 years ago.

Often the pollen that bees feed to their larvae is contaminated with pesticides. This could be making matters worse because bees exposed to low doses of a highly toxic group of pesticides called neonicotinoids have reduced resistance to disease.

Another explanation the authors offer is that bee genes may have changed. Honeybee lifespan is linked to their genes. Artificial (by beekeepers) or natural selection may favour bees with shorter lifespans. Scientists are seeing this happen in other species. For example cod now mature earlier and when they are smaller in size because overfishing means fish rarely survive long enough to grow large.

Perhaps stressors in the modern world, such as pesticides and disease, mean honeybees rarely survive for a long time. So their evolution might favour a live-fast-die-young lifestyle.

Everyone’s problem

Bees are already facing many pressures on their survival. A separate study by the University of Bristol, released in November 2022, found that fertilisers are altering plants’ electric field which is changing the way bees sense flowers. It is putting them off from visiting flowers. And bee habitat is disappearing. Since the 1930s, 97% of wildflower meadows have been lost in the UK as farming has intensified.

Fascinating though it is, this new study raises more questions than it answers (as good science usually does). The data is based on groups of worker bees kept in cages. This method is often used to study the effects of stressors (such as pesticides) on bees.

In these sorts of experiments, researchers would normally set up control groups at the same time and under identical conditions. Nearman and van Engelsdorp used the historical data from control groups in many such studies carried out around the USA since 1969. As the authors acknowledge, this is a weakness in their report.

They can’t guarantee that lab conditions have stayed the same since 1969. Perhaps older studies tended to use wooden cages and modern ones use plastic. Cage sizes may become smaller or larger. The ariflow in modern incubators may now be faster – or slower. Such details are rarely noted. Anything that changed over the past 50 years could explain the reduction in longevity.

It won’t be easy for scientists to unravel the study’s findings. But if we could find historical data on wild honeybee longevity from previous decades, we could compare them with measurements from today’s world. This would help scientists rule out the possibility that the study’s results were affected by lab conditions.

Reduced bee life expectancy means reduced pollination. Bees and other pollinating insects are essential to a good harvest for 75% of the crops we grow worldwide. They also pollinate about 80% of all wild plants. All species of bees face similar challenges to honeybees, but we do not know if their life expectancy has changed. If bees are really living for less time in the wild, we need to know why.

Dave Goulson, Professor of Biology (Evolution, Behavior and Environment), University of Sussex

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

European_bees_2022_compressedDownload

[af1]

i have deformed wing virus