生物谷報道：密集地居住在一起、過著有秩序的集體生活有什么好處,？一群研究蜜蜂的澳大利亞科學家會告訴你,，這能增強生物抵抗細菌的能力。
據(jù)美國《科學》雜志網(wǎng)站報道,，這個研究小組新近發(fā)現(xiàn),，群體生活使蜜蜂具有格外強的免疫力，而且蜂群越大,、越密集,，蜜蜂抵抗疾病的能力越強。這是人們頭一次找到免疫系統(tǒng)進化與社會行為之間有關(guān)的確切證據(jù)，將為研制下一代抗生素提供線索,。
群居的生物感染疾病的危險較高,，昆蟲和人類都是這樣。很久以來科學家一直猜測,，蜜蜂和其他群居的昆蟲可能進化出了較強的抗病能力,，例如分泌抗菌物質(zhì)覆蓋體表，以此對抗群居生活的危險,。群落越大,、越密集，環(huán)境壓力就越大,，促使昆蟲進化出更強的抗病能力,，而這又反過來促使群落進一步變大。
為了檢驗這一理論,，澳大利亞新南威爾士大學和南澳大利亞博物館的科學家收集了多種蜜蜂,，其中有的獨來獨往，根本不過社會化生活,；有的半社會化,，與姐妹和后代組成小群落生活；有的生活在高度社會化的大集體中,，分工明確,。科學家將這些蜜蜂體表的保護層洗掉,，將所得的溶液來處理金黃色葡萄球菌,，進行觀察。
結(jié)果顯示,，所有含蜜蜂體表物質(zhì)的溶液都能殺死細菌,，但社會化生活的蜜蜂的體表物質(zhì)抗菌能力比人們原先預(yù)料的高得多。與最孤僻的蜜蜂相比,，最社會化的蜜蜂體表物質(zhì)抗菌能力要高出３１４倍,，僅輕度社會化的蜜蜂也高出１０倍多。這一結(jié)果發(fā)表在最新一期《生物學通訊》上,。
研究人員說,，蜜蜂和其他昆蟲分泌的抗菌物質(zhì)，可望用來研制下一代抗生素,。
英文原文：
Science,，Daily News Archive > 2007 > May > 16 May (Telis)
The Benefits of Bee-ing Social
By Gisela Telis
ScienceNOW Daily News
16 May 2007
Social bees have surprisingly strong body armor against microbes, researchers have found. And the more gregarious the bees--the larger their colonies and the more closely related--the better they are at beating disease. The discovery is the first clear link between the evolution of immune systems and social behavior, and it dangles a new hope for bioprospectors on the trail of the next generation of antibiotics.
Insects, like humans, face greater risks of catching and spreading infectious diseases when they're crowded together. Scientists have long suspected that bees and other bugs combat the added risk that being social incurs by evolving stronger disease defenses, such as secreting antimicrobial agents to cover their bodies. The theory is that bigger colonies with more crowded conditions would require insects to evolve better immune defenses, which in turn enable the insects to evolve still-bigger colonies.
To test the idea, biologists Adam Stow, Andrew Beattie, and their colleagues at Macquarie University in New South Wales and the South Australian Museum in Adelaide collected bees from across the social spectrum: blue-banded bees and teddy bear bees, which are solitary and live in their own nests without partners or workers; semisocial reed bees that partner with their sisters and their offspring in small colonies; and Australian native honey bees, which form large colonies of closely related individuals with sophisticated divisions of labor. The scientists then washed the protective coatings from the bees' bodies and applied the resulting solution to the notorious Staphylococcus aureus (staph) bacterium.
By measuring how much of each solution it took to stop the staph's growth, the researchers determined the strength of each kind of bee's body coating. All the coatings killed bacteria, but the social bees' antimicrobials proved much more powerful than expected, says Stow. Antimicrobial armor from the most social bees was 314 times stronger than that from the most solitary bees, the team reports online this week in Biology Letters, and even the most mildly social bees were 10 times more protected than their solitary counterparts.
The mysterious bacteria-busting secretions of bees and other insects could someday offer an alternative to today's antibiotics, says Stow. "If you're going to look in nature for antibiotics," he says, "this tells you where to look."
For Oxford ecologist Robert May, the finding is crucial and long overdue. "While the idea isn't new, the demonstration is clear, elegant, and the first,?he says. "It's just very nice."
原始出處:
Biology Letters，10.1098/rsbl.2007.0178
Antimicrobial defences increase with sociality in bees Adam Stow, David Briscoe, Michael Gillings, Marita Holley, Shannon Smith, Remko Leys, Tish Silberbauer, Christine Turnbull, Andrew Beattie
