Various animal models are used in the study of alcoholism, with the honeybee (Apis mellifera L.) among them. Here, we tested the hypothesis that foragers show higher intoxication resistance to alcohol than nurses, an issue thus far not investigated. To this end, we measured the latency to full sedation when exposed to alcohol in foragers, nurses and reverted nurses. In addition, we measured alcohol dehydrogenase (ADH) levels in these worker castes. Caste status was confirmed by comparison of the size of their hypopharyngeal glands. We detected high intoxication resistance to alcohol and presence of ADH in foragers. In nurses, we detected significantly lower intoxication resistance to alcohol and no ADH. These between-caste differences cannot be explained by the age difference between castes as in reverted nurses, characterized by similar age to foragers, we detected an intermediate intoxication resistance to alcohol and no ADH. Our results suggest possible natural exposure to alcohol in different castes of workers. As such, we further develop the honeybee as a model in alcoholism-related research and open new research avenues.

中文翻译：

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蜜蜂种姓之间的酒精中毒抵抗力和酒精脱氢酶水平不同

各种动物模型用于酒精中毒的研究，其中包括蜜蜂（Apis mellifera L.）。在这里，我们检验了这样一个假设，即觅食者比护士表现出更高的酒精中毒抵抗力，这是迄今为止尚未研究过的问题。为此，我们测量了觅食者、护士和复职护士暴露于酒精时完全镇静的潜伏期。此外，我们测量了这些工人种姓的酒精脱氢酶 (ADH) 水平。通过比较下咽腺的大小来确认种姓状态。我们在觅食者中检测到对酒精的高度抗中毒和 ADH 的存在。在护士中，我们检测到对酒精的中毒抵抗力显着降低，并且没有 ADH。这些种姓之间的差异不能像恢复护士那样用种姓之间的年龄差异来解释，与觅食者的年龄相似，我们检测到对酒精的中等中毒抵抗力，没有 ADH。我们的结果表明，不同种姓的工人可能自然接触酒精。因此，我们进一步将蜜蜂发展为酗酒相关研究的模型，并开辟新的研究途径。