All species need to reproduce to maintain viable populations, but heat stress kills sperm cells across the animal kingdom and rising frequencies of heatwaves are a threat to biodiversity. Honey bees (Apis mellifera) are globally distributed micro-livestock; therefore, they could serve as environmental biomonitors for heat-induced reductions in fertility. Here, we found that queens have two potential routes of temperature-stress exposure: within colonies and during routine shipping. Our data suggest that temperatures of 15 to 38°C are safe for queens at a tolerance threshold of 11.5% loss of sperm viability, which is the viability difference between failed and healthy queens collected from beekeepers. Heat shock activates expression of specific ATP-independent heat-shock proteins in the spermatheca, which could serve as biomarkers for heat stress. This protein fingerprint may eventually enable surveys for the prevalence of heat-induced loss of sperm viability in diverse landscapes as part of a biomonitoring program.

中文翻译：

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蜜蜂皇后区的热危险

所有物种都需要繁殖才能维持存活的种群，但是热应激会杀死整个动物界的精子细胞，而且热浪频率的上升也威胁到生物多样性。蜜蜂（Apis mellifera）是全球分布的微型牲畜；因此，它们可以作为环境生物监测器，用于热诱导的生育力降低。在这里，我们发现皇后有两种潜在的温度压力暴露途径：在殖民地内和常规运输期间。我们的数据表明，温度为15至38°C对于皇后是安全的，公差阈值为精子活力损失11.5％，这是从养蜂人那里收集的失败和健康皇后之间的生存力差异。热激激活了精囊中特定于ATP的非热休克蛋白的表达，这可以用作热应激的生物标记。