TY  - JOUR
A1  - Değirmenci, Laura
A1  - Rogé Ferreira, Fabio Luiz
A1  - Vukosavljevic, Adrian
A1  - Heindl, Cornelia
A1  - Keller, Alexander
A1  - Geiger, Dietmar
A1  - Scheiner, Ricarda
T1  - Sugar perception in honeybees
JF  - Frontiers in Physiology
N2  - Honeybees (Apis mellifera) need their fine sense of taste to evaluate nectar and pollen sources. Gustatory receptors (Grs) translate taste signals into electrical responses. In vivo experiments have demonstrated collective responses of the whole Gr-set. We here disentangle the contributions of all three honeybee sugar receptors (AmGr1-3), combining CRISPR/Cas9 mediated genetic knock-out, electrophysiology and behaviour. We show an expanded sugar spectrum of the AmGr1 receptor. Mutants lacking AmGr1 have a reduced response to sucrose and glucose but not to fructose. AmGr2 solely acts as co-receptor of AmGr1 but not of AmGr3, as we show by electrophysiology and using bimolecular fluorescence complementation. Our results show for the first time that AmGr2 is indeed a functional receptor on its own. Intriguingly, AmGr2 mutants still display a wildtype-like sugar taste. AmGr3 is a specific fructose receptor and is not modulated by a co-receptor. Eliminating AmGr3 while preserving AmGr1 and AmGr2 abolishes the perception of fructose but not of sucrose. Our comprehensive study on the functions of AmGr1, AmGr2 and AmGr3 in honeybees is the first to combine investigations on sugar perception at the receptor level and simultaneously in vivo. We show that honeybees rely on two gustatory receptors to sense all relevant sugars.
KW  - AmGr1
KW  - AmGr2
KW  - AmGr3
KW  - sugar responsiveness
KW  - proboscis extension response (PER)
KW  - gustatory receptors (Grs)
KW  - honeybee taste perception
Y1  - 2023
U6  - http://nbn-resolving.de/urn/resolver.pl?urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-302284
SN  - 1664-042X
VL  - 13
ER  -