For many hymenopteran insects, floral pollen is essential for survival and development. Nutritional analysis of floral pollen is important to understand plant–pollinator interactions. Here, we evaluated a simple method for measuring proteins and amino acids in pollen; it requires samples far smaller than are required by conventional methods. We used a fluorometer for quantitative analysis of protein and investigated its accuracy with small samples (0.01–2.99 mg). Quantitative and qualitative analysis of amino acids was performed by conventional HPLC methods but with smaller samples (0.05–3.0 mg). The two analyses were highly accurate with samples of ≥1.0 mg. Our method allows nutritional analysis of pollen from a wide range of flower species, including those producing only small amounts of pollen, contributing to a better understanding of the interactions between flowers and flower-visiting insects.

对于许多膜翅目昆虫来说，花粉对生存和发展至关重要。花粉的营养分析对于了解植物 - 传粉媒介的相互作用很重要。在这里，我们评估了一种测量花粉中蛋白质和氨基酸的简单方法；它需要的样品远小于传统方法所需的样品。我们使用荧光计对蛋白质进行定量分析，并用小样本 (0.01–2.99 mg) 研究其准确性。氨基酸的定量和定性分析是通过传统的 HPLC 方法进行的，但样本较小（0.05-3.0 mg）。对于≥1.0 mg 的样品，这两种分析都非常准确。我们的方法允许对来自各种花卉种类的花粉进行营养分析，包括那些只产生少量花粉的花粉，