A honey bee is a eusocial flying insect within the genus Apis of the bee clade, all native to mainland Afro-Eurasia. After bees spread naturally throughout Africa and Eurasia, humans became responsible for the current cosmopolitan distribution of honey bees, introducing multiple subspecies into South America, North America, and Australia.
Coronaviruses are a group of related RNA viruses that cause diseases in mammals and birds. In humans and birds, they cause respiratory tract infections that can range from mild to lethal. Mild illnesses in humans include some cases of the common cold, while more lethal varieties can cause SARS, MERS and COVID-19. In cows and pigs they cause diarrhea, while in mice they cause hepatitis and encephalomyelitis.
Picornaviruses are a group of related nonenveloped RNA viruses which infect vertebrates including fish, mammals, and birds. They are viruses that represent a large family of small, positive-sense, single-stranded RNA viruses with a 30 nm icosahedral capsid. The viruses in this family can cause a range of diseases including the common cold, poliomyelitis, meningitis, hepatitis, and paralysis.
Nosema apis is a microsporidian, a small, unicellular parasite recently reclassified as a fungus that mainly affects honey bees. It causes nosemosis, also called nosema, which is the most common and widespread of adult honey bee diseases. The dormant stage of N. apis is a long-lived spore which is resistant to temperature extremes and dehydration, and cannot be killed by freezing the contaminated comb. Nosemosis is a listed disease with the Office International des Epizooties (OIE).
Varroa destructor, the Varroa mite, is an external parasitic mite that attacks and feeds on honey bees and is one of the most damaging honey bee pests in the world. A significant mite infestation leads to the death of a honey bee colony, usually in the late autumn through early spring. Without management for Varroa mite, honey bee colonies typically collapse within 2 to 3 years in temperate climates. These mites can infest Apis mellifera, the western honey bee, and Apis cerana, the Asian honey bee. Due to very similar physical characteristics, this species was thought to be the closely related Varroa jacobsoni prior to 2000, but they were found to be two separate species after DNA analysis.
Potyvirus is a genus of positive-strand RNA viruses in the family Potyviridae. Plants serve as natural hosts. Like begomoviruses, members of this genus may cause significant losses in agricultural, pastoral, horticultural, and ornamental crops. More than 200 species of aphids spread potyviruses, and most are from the subfamily Aphidinae. The genus contains 190 species and potyviruses account for about thirty percent of all currently known plant viruses.
Deformed wing virus (DWV) is an RNA virus, one of 22 known viruses affecting honey bees. While most commonly infecting the honey bee, Apis mellifera, it has also been documented in other bee species, like Bombus terrestris, thus, indicating it may have a wider host specificity than previously anticipated. The virus was first isolated from a sample of symptomatic honeybees from Japan in the early 1980s and is currently distributed worldwide. It is found also in pollen baskets and commercially reared bumblebees. Its main vector in A. mellifera is the Varroa mite. It is named after what is usually the most obvious deformity it induces in the development of a honeybee pupa, which is shrunken and deformed wings, but other developmental deformities are often present.
The East African lowland honey bee is a subspecies of the western honey bee. It is native to central, southern and eastern Africa, though at the southern extreme it is replaced by the Cape honey bee. This subspecies has been determined to constitute one part of the ancestry of the Africanized bees spreading through North and South America.
Strawberry mottle virus (SMV) is a pathogenic plant virus in Secoviridae, a family of plant-infecting picornaviruses. It is not yet assigned to a genus. Virions are isometric, approximately 28 nm in diameter, and contain two RNA strands (RNA1 and RNA2) equal to about 12,600 nucleotides in length. The polyprotein of RNA1 contains regions identified as helicase, protease, RNA-dependent RNA polymerase and a viral genome-linked protein while RNA2 shows similarities to the large coat protein domain of the Satsuma dwarf virus.
Animal viruses are viruses that infect animals. Viruses infect all cellular life and although viruses infect every animal, plant, fungus and protist species, each has its own specific range of viruses that often infect only that species.
Marnaviridae is a family of positive-stranded RNA viruses in the order Picornavirales that infect various photosynthetic marine protists. Members of the family have non-enveloped, icosahedral capsids. Replication occurs in the cytoplasm and causes lysis of the host cell. The first species of this family that was isolated is Heterosigma akashiwo RNA virus (HaRNAV) in the genus Marnavirus, which infects the toxic bloom-forming Raphidophyte alga, Heterosigma akashiwo. As of 2021, there are twenty species across seven genera in this family, as well as many other related virus sequences discovered through metagenomic sequencing that are currently unclassified.
Iflaviridae is a family of positive sense RNA viruses insect-infecting viruses. Some of the insects commonly infected by iflaviruses include aphids, leafhoppers, flies, bees, ants, silkworms and wasps. The name "Ifla" is derived from the name "Infectious flacherie virus", a member species. There is one genus (Iflavirus) and 16 species in this family.
Picornavirales is an order of viruses with vertebrate, invertebrate, protist and plant hosts. The name has a dual etymology. First, picorna- is an acronym for poliovirus, insensitivity to ether, coxsackievirus, orphan virus, rhinovirus, and ribonucleic acid. Secondly, pico-, meaning extremely small, combines with RNA to describe these very small RNA viruses. The order comprises viruses that historically are referred to as picorna-like viruses.
Apis cerana, the eastern honey bee, Asiatic honey bee or Asian honey bee, is a species of honey bee native to South, Southeast and East Asia. This species is the sister species of Apis koschevnikovi and both are in the same subgenus as the western (European) honey bee, Apis mellifera. A. cerana is known to live sympatrically along with Apis koschevnikovi within the same geographic location. Apis cerana colonies are known for building nests consisting of multiple combs in cavities containing a small entrance, presumably for defense against invasion by individuals of another nest. The diet of this honey bee species consists mostly of pollen and nectar, or honey. Moreover, Apis cerana is known for its highly social behavior, reflective of its classification as a type of honey bee.
Apocephalus borealis is a species of North American parasitoid phorid fly that attacks bumblebees, honey bees, and paper wasps. This parasitoid's genus Apocephalus is best known for the "decapitating flies" that attack a variety of ant species, though A. borealis attacks and alters the behavior of bees and wasps. These flies are colloquially known as zombie flies and the bees they infect are colloquially known as zombees. Association with honey bees has so far only been documented from California, South Dakota, Oregon, Washington, British Columbia, and Vermont.
Chronic bee paralysis virus (CBPV) commonly affects adult Apis mellifera honey bees and causes a chronic paralysis that can easily spread to other members of a colony. Bees infected with CBPV begin to show symptoms after 5 days and die a few days after. Chronic bee paralysis virus infection is a factor that can contribute to or cause the sudden collapse of honeybee colonies. Since honeybees serve a vital role in ecological resilience, it is important to understand factors and diseases that threaten them.
Slow bee paralysis virus (SBPV) is a virus discovered in England in 1974 that infects honeybees, bumblebees, and silkworms through Varroa destructor mite infestations. The virus causes paralysis in the front two pairs of legs of adult bees eventually killing its hosts. The virus is in the iflaviridae family of viruses. Infection by iflaviridae viruses is among the leading cause of death of honeybee colonies. As bees and silkworms are of great economic and biological importance, the virus is the subject of ongoing research.
The black queen cell virus (BQCV) is a virus that infects honey bees, specifically Apis mellifera, Apis florea, and Apis dorsata. Infection of the latter two species is more recent and can be attributed to genetic similarity and geographical closeness.
The evolution of the Sacbrood virus (SBV) is characterized by the genomic changes that have occurred in SBV since its initial discovery in 1913, which have enabled the virus to continuously infect a wide array of honeybee colonies. SBV is single stranded RNA virus (genus: Iflavirus) that most commonly infects honeybee larvae, and is known to wipe out entire honeybee colonies quickly. Due to SBV, there has been sharp declines in honey bee populations in Europe, as well as a 30% decline each year in U.S. colonies. Studies on the evolution of SBV have arisen in hopes to stop these colony devastations. SBV is one of the most widely studied honeybee viruses in terms of genomic analysis, leading to it having the highest number of complete genomes isolated compared to any other viruses known to honeybees. Through these genome studies, it has been found that there are two distinct lineages of SBV, each characterized by a high mutation rate, leading to multiple subtypes in both lineages. In studying how these lineages have evolved through time, new discoveries in their pathogenicity and different honeybee resistance mechanisms have been unveiled.
