Honey Bee Reserch

Honey bees are studied extensively, also because they are fascinating organisms. Bees have captured mankind's attention since as early as Aristotle. Not only because they produce honey and honey is the earliest sweetener human beings have found, but because of their industriousness (working to their death), selflessness (producing honey for humans and dying to defend their home), and most importantly, their social organization. Honey bees, like other social insects, show "division of labor" whereby different workers specialize on different tasks. In some sense, the complexity of their society rivals that of our own. Who governs their day-to-day chores? How do workers know what to do in a city bustling with tens of thousands of individuals? Clearly these have been the questions of humankind since long time ago, as evidenced in the Bible: "Ants are creatures of little strength, yet they store up their food in the summer...Locusts have no king, yet they advance together in ranks." [Proverbs 30: 25-27].