Project description
Understanding host-parasite interactions
The Alpis mellifera or honeybee is of great economic and ecological importance, providing highly valued pollination services for a wide variety of crops. The ectoparasitic mite Varroa destructor is one of the most devastating pests of the honeybee and the main cause of its mortality worldwide. Bees' survival is highly dependent on mite control treatment which removes the need to have a stable host-parasite relationship and therefore obstructs the evolution of resistance. As a result, research on the natural selection host-parasite coevolution can be carried out on a few small honeybee populations. The EU-funded BEE NATURAL project has access to these populations and aims to describe their host resistant and tolerant phenotypes towards both mites and viruses.
Objective
The ectoparasitic mite, Varroa destructor, vectors lethal honeybee viruses, in particular Deformed wing virus (DWV) and is unarguably the leading cause of honeybee (Apis mellifera) colony mortality world-wide causing critical economic and ecological consequences for pollination-dependent crop production and wild plant biodiversity, respectively. Since the introduction of the mite in the 1970s and 1980s, wild honeybees in Europe and North America have been nearly completely eradicated and managed honeybees only survive through mite control treatment, or otherwise die within 1-2 years. These treatments remove the selective pressure necessary to establish a stable host-parasite relationship, which hampers the evolution of resistance and obstructs fundamental research on natural selection host‒parasite coevolution in this new host‒parasite system, which is now only possible in a few small honeybee populations surviving long-term (>20 years) without varroa control in Sweden, France and Norway. These rare and valuable naturally selected populations offer unique insight into the natural adaptive capacity of honeybees, yet little is understood about their mechanisms of resistance or tolerance to varroa mites and the viruses they vector.
Having exclusive access to these populations, the BEE NATURAL project sets out to comprehensively describe their host resistant and tolerant phenotypes towards both mites and viruses, using a variety of innovative experimental designs, in order to deeper our fundamental understanding of host-parasite interactions. Genomic regions or target genes associated with resistant and tolerant traits will be identified using Next Generation Sequencing (NGS) technologies such as RNA-seq and whole genome sequencing (WGS), providing valuable information that can be applied towards developing marker-assisted selection: a powerful new approach for disease resistant breeding that can facilitate major advances in genetic stock improvement.
Fields of science (EuroSciVoc)
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: The European Science Vocabulary.
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: The European Science Vocabulary.
- natural sciences biological sciences microbiology virology
- natural sciences biological sciences evolutionary biology
- natural sciences biological sciences zoology entomology apidology
- natural sciences biological sciences ecology ecosystems
- natural sciences biological sciences genetics genomes
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Keywords
Project’s keywords as indicated by the project coordinator. Not to be confused with the EuroSciVoc taxonomy (Fields of science)
Project’s keywords as indicated by the project coordinator. Not to be confused with the EuroSciVoc taxonomy (Fields of science)
Programme(s)
Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
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H2020-EU.1.1. - EXCELLENT SCIENCE - European Research Council (ERC)
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Calls for proposals are divided into topics. A topic defines a specific subject or area for which applicants can submit proposals. The description of a topic comprises its specific scope and the expected impact of the funded project.
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Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.
ERC-STG - Starting Grant
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Call for proposal
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(opens in new window) ERC-2020-STG
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750 07 Uppsala
Sweden
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