Ying Wang

Arizona State University | ASU · School of Life Sciences

In many organisms, interactions among genes lead to multiple functional states, and changes to interactions can lead to transitions into new states. These transitions can be related to bifurcations (or critical points) in dynamical systems theory. Characterizing these collective transitions is a major challenge for systems biology. Here, we develop...

Honey bees (Apis mellifera) provide an excellent model for studying how complex social behavior evolves and is regulated. Social behavioral traits such as the division of labor have been mapped to specific genomic regions in quantitative trait locus (QTL) studies. However, relating genomic mapping to gene function and regulatory mechanism remains a...

The effect of larval nutrition on female fertility in honey bees is a focus for both scientific studies and for practical applications in beekeeping. In general, morphological traits are standards for classifying queens and workers and for evaluating their quality. In recent years, in vitro rearing techniques have been improved and used in many stu...

Though social insect colonies are often considered to be models of cooperative behavior, there can be conflict between queens and their workers over reproduction. In honey bees (Apis mellifera), the queen releases a pheromone that attracts workers and inhibits worker ovary activation such that they remain sterile and rear the offspring of the queen...

Variation in endocrine signaling is proposed to underlie the evolution and regulation of social life histories, but the genetic architecture of endocrine signaling is still poorly understood. An excellent example of a hormonally influenced set of social traits is found in the honey bee (Apis mellifera): a dynamic and mutually suppressive relationsh...

The evolution of nonreproductive castes is a fundamental question in evolution biology. Honey bee workers , nonreproductive females, don’t reproduce when the queen present in the nest, but have ovaries. The number of ovarioles (ovarian filaments) influences the worker social behavior as well as propensity to become an egg-layer in the absence of th...

The evolution of nonreproductive castes is a fundamental question in evolution biology. The honeybee Apis mellifera L. has a reproductive division of labour: the queen is the primary egg-layer in a colony and has more than 200 ovarian filaments (ovarioles), whereas a worker normally does not reproduce and has fewer than 20 ovarioles. The number of...

As eusocial insects, honey bee brood is taken care of by nurses (young worker bees). Although nurses control overall the quality of new generation of workers, the colony nutrition state and environmental nutrition flow affects worker body size and ovariole number. Previous studies have shown that ovariole number is an important factor influencing w...

The food a honey bee female larva receives determines whether she develops into a large long-lived fertile queen or a short-lived sterile worker. Through well-established nutrient sensing and growth promoting functions in metazoans, the insulin/insulin-like growth factor 1 signaling (IIS) pathway has become a focal topic in investigations on how di...

This video demonstrates novel techniques of RNA interference (RNAi) which downregulate two genes simultaneously in honey bees using double-stranded RNA (dsRNA) injections. It also presents a protocol of proboscis extension response (PER) assay for measuring gustatory perception. RNAi-mediated gene knockdown is an effective technique downregulating...

Despite their tremendous economic importance, and apart from certain topics in the field of neurophysiology such as vision, olfaction, learning and memory, honey bees are not a typical model system for studying general questions of insect physiology. The reason is their social lifestyle, which sets them apart from a "typical insect" and, during soc...

Larval nutrition in many solitary insects affects adult body size, fecundity and lifespan. In honeybees, malnutrition is largely responsible for colony losses. Although carbonization by workers is applied to malnourished larvae at early stage, the elder malnourished larvae are able to develop to adults. Here, we performed the starvation on honeybee...

Honey bees (Apis mellifera) provide a system for studying social and food-related behavior. A caste of workers performs age-related tasks: young bees (nurses) usually feed the brood and other adult bees inside the nest, while older bees (foragers) forage outside for pollen, a protein/lipid source, or nectar, a carbohydrate source. The workers' tran...

Several lines of evidence support genetic links between ovary size and division of labor in worker honey bees. However, it is largely unknown how ovaries influence behavior. To address this question, we first performed transcriptional profiling on worker ovaries from two genotypes that differ in social behavior and ovary size. Then, we contrasted t...

Nutrient signals play very important roles in queen and worker caste development in the honey bee. It has been suggested that insulin peptides (ilps) were involved in caste development in larvae. In this study, we knocked down ilp2 in larvae and monitored the larvae development and physiology. We found ilp2 was successfully down regulated by dsRNA....

PTEN RNAi during larval development. Test of gene knockdown in honey bee larvae fed worker (A) vs. queen (B) diet in each of two separate experiments (n = 24). The larvae were fed with a lower dosage (150 µg/ml). Compared to the controls, the low dosage of dsRNA did not lead to measurable PTEN down-regulation at the whole-body level, neither for th...

Effect of PTEN RNAi on physiological characters. (A) Adult wet weight at emergence. Q-controls were heavier than the bees fed PTEN dsRNA and the W-controls (n = 20). Intercastes were characterized by enlarged abdomen (Fig. S1A and B), lower adult wet weight (controls: 187.6–232.7 mg vs. PTEN dsRNA fed group: 156.9–221.6 mg; Mann-Whitney U tests, p<...

Phosphatase and TENsin (PTEN) homolog is a negative regulator that takes part in IIS (insulin/insulin-like signaling) and Egfr (epidermal growth factor receptor) activation in Drosophila melanogaster. IIS and Egfr signaling events are also involved in the developmental process of queen and worker differentiation in honey bees (Apis mellifera). Here...

BACKGROUND: The sterile honey bee worker varies in a series of behavioral traits including gustatory responsiveness, age of onset of foraging, and foraging bias towards pollen or nectar. It has been demonstrated that vitellogenin, an egg-yolk protein precursor, is a behavior affector directly influencing the worker foraging behavior. In addition, i...

Honey bee (Apis mellifera L.) workers are essentially sterile females that are used to study how complex social behavior develops. Workers perform nest tasks, like nursing larvae, prior to field tasks, like foraging. Despite worker sterility, this behavioral progression correlates with ovary size: workers with larger ovaries (many ovary filaments)...

Hemolymph glucose measurements: materials, methods, and results for quantification of hemolymph (blood) levels of glucose in high and low pollen-hoarding strain bees. (0.17 MB PDF)

Food choice and eating behavior affect health and longevity. Large-scale research efforts aim to understand the molecular and social/behavioral mechanisms of energy homeostasis, body weight, and food intake. Honey bees (Apis mellifera) could provide a model for these studies since individuals vary in food-related behavior and social factors can be...

The genetic basis of division of labor in social insects is a central question in evolutionary and behavioral biology. The honey bee is a model for studying evolutionary behavioral genetics because of its well characterized age-correlated division of labor. After an initial period of within-nest tasks, 2-3 week-old worker bees begin foraging outsid...

Lung injury promotes the expression of matrix metalloproteinase-7 (MMP7, matrilysin), which is required for neutrophil recruitment and re-epithelialization. MMP7 governs the lung inflammatory response through the shedding of syndecan-1. Because inflammation and repair are related events, we evaluated the role of syndecan-1 shedding in lung re-epith...

Wound closure of wild-type and MMP7−/− ALI cultures. Wild-type and MMP7−/− ALI cultures were injured and wound closure was observed over 24 hours. (21.22 MB MOV)

Materials and Methods of QTL study (0.02 MB DOC)

Log transformation of the relative mRNA levels of PAR3 (Mean±s.e.m.) in the abdomen of high (blue bars) (n = 12) and low strain (red bars) bees (n = 12). The mRNA levels are measured as relative quantities (RQ). It shows there is no significant difference in PAR3 expression between high and low strain newly emerged bees and foragers. (0.13 MB TIF)

Primers of real-time PCR for the candidate genes. (0.03 MB DOC)

Log transformation of the relative mRNA levels of HR46 (Mean±s.e.m.) in the brain of high (blue bars) (n = 12) and low strain (red bars) bees (n = 12). The mRNA levels are measured as relative quantities (RQ). It shows there is no significant difference in HR46 expression between high and low strain newly emerged bees and foragers in brain. (0.11 M...

Log transformation of the relative mRNA levels of IRS (Mean±s.e.m.) in the abdomen of high (blue bars) (n = 12) and low strain (red bars) bees (n = 12). The mRNA levels are measured as relative quantities (RQ). It shows there is no significant difference in IRS expression between high and low strain newly emerged bees and foragers. (0.11 MB TIF)

Statistical analysis results of PDK1 and HR46 in brain of high and low strain bees. (0.03 MB DOC)

Statistical analysis results of PAR3, PI3K and IRS in abdomen of high and low strain bees. (0.04 MB DOC)

Log transformation of the relative mRNA levels of PDK1 (Mean±s.e.m.) in the brain of high (blue bars) (n = 12) and low strain (red bars) bees (n = 12). The mRNA levels are measured as relative quantities (RQ). PDK1 shows no significant difference between high and low strain newly emerged bees and foragers in brain. (0.11 MB TIF)

Log transformation of the relative mRNA levels of PI3K (Mean±s.e.m.) in the abdomen of high (blue bars) (n = 12) and low strain (red bars) bees (n = 12). The mRNA levels are measured as relative quantities (RQ). It shows there is no significant difference in PI3K expression between high and low strain newly emerged bees and foragers. (0.06 MB TIF)

Markers used to evaluate direct effects of behavioral QTL on worker ovary size. (0.03 MB DOC)

The genetic basis of division of labor in social insects is a central question in evolutionary and behavioral biology. The honey bee is a model for studying evolutionary behavioral genetics because of its well characterized age-correlated division of labor. After an initial period of within-nest tasks, 2-3 week-old worker bees begin foraging outsid...