Metrics details Alzheimer's disease (AD) is considered the leading cause of dementia in the elderly worldwide It results in progressive memory loss and impairment of cognitive and motor skills leading to a high degree of disability and dependence The development of AD is associated with the accumulation of senile plaques in the brain caused by the amyloidogenic pathway of the disease Several genetic and biochemical events are linked to AD development Due to the scarcity of drugs aimed at treating AD antioxidant compounds are increasingly studied as therapeutic targets for the disease we investigate the antioxidant and anti-Alzheimer potential of the Tetragonisca angustula (Jataí) pollen extract in a Drosophila melanogaster Alzheimer's model which expresses genes related to the amyloidogenic pathway of Alzheimer's disease We explored the floral origin of the collected pollen and evaluated its antioxidant capacity in vitro In vivo experiments involved assessing the survival and climbing ability of the D melanogaster AD-like model with various concentrations of the pollen extract Our findings revealed that the pollen extract of Tetragonisca angustula exhibits a significant antioxidant response and high concentrations of important phytochemicals it improved the climbing ability of the flies after 15 days of treatment with methanolic pollen extract the pollen extract reduced the neurodegeneration index in histopathological analysis our study demonstrates the potential of Tetragonisca angustula pollen as an important subject for further investigation aiming to isolate molecules that could potentially serve as therapeutic targets for Alzheimer's disease we administered methanolic pollen extract from Tetragonisca angustula Laitrelle (Apidae) to a D melanogaster model of Alzheimer's disease and assessed its antioxidant properties and anti-Alzheimer’s potential We identified 12 different pollen types, with Solanum lycopersicum (Solanaceae), Cenostigma pluviosum (Fabaceae) and Peltophorum dubium (Fabaceae) being the most abundant. These three species represented 76.66% of pollen types sampled (Fig. 1). Identification and frequency percentage of pollen types found in Tetragonisca angustula pots Evaluation of antioxidant capacity by methods (A) ORAC The pollen extract and the flavonoid quercetin were diluted in methanol Samples were diluted to 1 mg/mL for the FRAP assay and serially diluted from that concentration for the DPPH assay Values were expressed as percent inhibition (%) for the DPPH method and as µmol trolox/g sample equivalents for ORAC and FRAP Different letters indicate non-significant difference when compared to the control (Ascorbate) (P < 0.05) Our untargeted metabolomics approach unveiled peaks corresponding to flavonoids such as quercetin, alongside other compounds like alosteron, quinaprilat, anhydrosafflor yellow B, pilocarpine and others (Fig. 3). Identification of compounds by LC–MS/MS Survival rate of AD-like flies treated with methanolic pollen extract at concentrations 0.1 mg/mL, 0.04 mg/mL, 0.02 mg/mL and 0.004 mg/mL, vehicle and untreated groups (N = 90 for each group). Statistical significance: (**) P < 0.01, (***) P < 0.001 and (****) P < 0.0001 (log-rank Mantel–Cox test). Percentage of death of AD-like flies treated with methanolic pollen extract at concentrations of 0.1 mg/mL vehicle and untreated (N = 90 for each group) in time interval of 7 AD-like model validation and climbing ability of AD-like flies after treatment with methanolic pollen extract (A) Comparison of climbing ability between Elav-Gal4 and AD-like genotypes at 5–8 (C) 10 days of treatment (D) 15 days of treatment Data are presented as mean ± SEM and significance values are represented as P < 0.05 (*) P < 0.01 (**) and P < 0.0001 (****) Unpaired two-tailed t-test Histology of the brain of AD-like model fly treated with methanolic pollen extract Representative 3-μm paraffin sections brain of flies 15-days after hatching Illustrative images of histopathologic analysis of (a) elav-Gal4 magnification of ×100; (b) AD-like treated with vehicle (tween) (d) Neurodegeneration index of AD-like flies treated with vehicle (tween) and pollen based on histopathology analysis and 5 indicates neurodegenerative phenotype (n = 3 The statistical significance is indicated as * for P < 0.05 (Mann Whitney test) and the impact of methanolic pollen extract on an Alzheimer's-like model Our findings unveiled the prevalence of three pollen types a high polyphenol and flavonoid content in the bee bread of T The methanolic extract exhibited antioxidant potential and proved effective in enhancing climbing ability and ameliorating damaged brain tissue in Drosophila melanogaster an alternative model of Alzheimer's disease Our results confirm that pollen from this stingless bee could serve as a valuable source of natural antioxidant compounds and flavonoids in the methanolic extract of T LC–MS/MS analysis identified specific compounds within these groups It's noteworthy that since the stingless bee T angustula collects and stores pollen in cerumen pots for fermentation the compounds detected in the metabolomics analysis may originate from pollen or from the metabolic activity of microorganisms Our results underscore the efficacy of the methanolic extract of T angustula pollen in enhancing climbing ability and repairing damaged brain tissue in the Drosophila melanogaster Alzheimer's disease model This highlights the biotechnological potential inherent in Brazil's biodiversity and in products harvested from indigenous bee colonies Our study exhibits promise for further assessment in murine models and biochemical assays aimed at identifying and isolating bioactive compounds It's important to note that additional investigations are necessary to determine the exact mechanism through which bee pollen improves cognitive function in neurodegenerative diseases our study offers crucial insights into the potential utilization of bee pollen as a therapeutic tool for addressing cognitive impairment in such conditions Analytical-grade reagents and solvents were purchased from Sigma (Sigma obtained by deionized and filtered water on a Millipore filter The pollen was harvested from two colonies of Tetragonisca angustula stingless bees located in an urban meliponary in Uberlândia city totaled 83 g and was transferred to a beaker 581 mL of absolute methanol (in a ratio of 1:7) were added to the beaker containing the pollen and stirred for 30 min the mixture was kept in the absence of light for 88 h at room temperature The resulting liquid was then filtered and processed using a rotary evaporator The obtained extract underwent lyophilization and freezing resulting in the production of 11 g of crude extract reference specimens housed at the Laboratory of Morphology and Plant Imaging (LAMOVI) at the Federal University of Uberlandia and observation of plants around the beehive Each glass slide was divided into four quadrants The extract was diluted in methanol at a concentration of 10 mg/mL involving the reduction of Folin's reagent (a mixture of phosphomolybdic and phosphotungstic acids) by phenolic compounds The procedure commenced by adding 5 µL of the sample 25 µL of an aqueous Folin–Ciocalteu reagent solution and 195 µL of milli-Q water into each well The plate was then incubated for 6 min at 25 °C 75 μL of sodium carbonate (7%) was introduced and the plate underwent another 2-h incubation at 25 °C in the absence of light Measurements were taken by assessing the absorbance using a spectrophotometer at a wavelength of 760 nm A parallel procedure was conducted using 5 µL of methanol to derive the blank Total phenol content was determined using an analytical curve constructed with gallic acid standards spanning concentrations of 31.25; 62.5; 125; 250; 500; 1000; and 2000 µg/mL The findings were expressed as milligrams of gallic acid equivalents per gram of the sample (mg GAE/g) 200 µL of a 4% methanolic vanillin solution The plate was incubated for 15 min at 25 °C and the absorbance was measured at a wavelength of 500 nm using a spectrophotometer The same process was repeated with 10 µL of methanol to establish the blank Total phenol content was quantified using an analytical curve constructed with catechin standards (CE) ranging from concentrations of 31.25; 62.5; 125; 250; 500; 1000; to 2000 µg/mL The results were expressed as milligrams of catechin equivalents per gram of the sample (mg CE/g) To determine the concentration of flavonoids and 10 µL of 5% sodium nitrite solution were added to each well The plate was then incubated for 6 min at 25 °C in the absence of light 20 μL of 10% aluminum chloride solution was added and the plate was incubated for an additional 6 min at 25 °C in the dark Absorbance was measured at a wavelength of 425 nm using a spectrophotometer The same procedure was repeated using 30 µL of methanol to establish the blank Flavonoid content was determined using an analytical curve constructed with a standard quercetin at concentrations of 31.25 The results were expressed as milligrams of quercetin equivalents per gram of the sample (mg QE/g) the pollen extract and the flavonoid quercetin were dissolved in methanol all at a concentration of 1 mg/mL for the FRAP (Ferric Reducing Antioxidant Power) method and 100 µg/mL for the ORAC (Oxygen Radical Absorbance Capacity) method For the DPPH (2,2-diphenyl-1-picrylhydrazyl) free radical scavenging method samples were serially diluted starting from a concentration of 1 mg/mL to determine the IC50 value The results for the DPPH assay were expressed as percentage (%) antioxidant capacity while the results for the FRAP and ORAC assays were presented as trolox equivalents (µmol trolox/g) Analysis of antioxidant capacity by the FRAP method was based on Benzie and Strain56 250 μL of FRAP reagent consisting of 10 volumes of sodium acetate buffer (0.3 mol/L and pH 3.6) 1 volume of 10 mmol/L of TPTZ (2,4,6-tri (2 piridil)-s-triazina) solution and 1 volume of aqueous ferric chloride solution (20 mmol/L)] 10 μL of extract/partition and 25 μL of milli-Q water was incubated for 6 min at 37 °C The absorbances were measured in a spectrophotometer at 593 nm and the antioxidant capacity was determined using an analytical curve constructed with trolox all reagents were prepared in phosphate buffer at 75 mmol/L and pH 7.4 25 μL of extract/partition were mixed with 150 μL of fluorescein (0.085 nmo/L) and incubated at room temperature for 15 min 30 μL of the 153 mmol/L Azobis solution (2,2′-Azobis(2-methylpropionamidine) dihydrochloride) was added to start the reaction The fluorescence intensity (485 nmex/528 nmem) was measured in a spectrofluorimeter and checked every 1 min and 30 s for 90 min The blank was performed replacing the extract/partition with phosphate buffer The loss of fluorescein fluorescence was measured using the area under the curve calculation and the antioxidant capacity was determined using an analytical curve constructed with trolox Samples were incubated with a methanolic solution of 60 mM DPPH at 30 °C for 20 min in the absence of light The assay started with 250 μL of extract/partition solubilized in 750 μL of methanolic DPPH solution The mixture containing extract/partition and ascorbic acid was incubated at 30 °C The reduction in the absorbance of the mixture was measured in a spectrophotometer at 517 nm The lyophilized methanolic extract was reconstituted in methanol at a concentration of 10 mg/mL and 10 µL of the sample volume was loaded onto the UPLC-ESI-QTOF-MS system (Waters) the columns were primed with 100% mobile phase A (a mixture of 97:3 water with 0.1% formic acid and acetonitrile) and 0% mobile phase B (acetonitrile containing 0.1% formic acid) Metabolites were separated on an analytical column ACQUITY UPLC H-Class HSS T3 C18 column with a particle size of 1.8 µm and dimensions of 2.1 × 100 mm (Waters using a flow rate of 0.5 mL/min and a gradient elution of 100% A from 0.0 to 1.0 min maintaining 5% A and 9% B from 8.0 to 8.5 min and holding at 100% A from 8.6 to 10.0 min Data-independent acquisition mode (MSE) was employed by operating the instrument in positive and negative ion V modes using MS and MS/MS functions in 0.2 s intervals with low-energy set at 0 V and high-energy collision set between 20 and 40 V to capture the mass-to-charge ratio (m/z) of the metabolites and the source temperature was maintained at 100 °C Leucine Enkephalin (556.2771 Da) was infused as an internal mass calibrant at a rate of 10 µL/min through the Lockspray ion source every 30 s Ion signal data were collected between 50 and 1200 m/z values and three LC–MS/MS runs were performed in each mode The search parameters were set as follow: the mass error was 5 ppm isotope similarity above 95 and adducts only M+H or M−H The duplicates information from different databases were removed The stock of flies was obtained from the Bloomington Stock Center: w1118 (BL #3605) The flies used were maintained in standard cornmeal medium (soybean powder 0.01% nipagin 0.06% and acid solution 0.05% m/v) and kept in an incubator with a light/dark cycle 12 h:12 h at 25 °C we conducted crosses utilizing virgin females from the elav-Gal4 lineage and males from the UAS-BACE-1; UAS-APP lineage selection occurred during the pupal stage based on phenotype discarding tubby-type pupae and choosing elongated ones (wild phenotype) as the AD model (elav-Gal4/+; UAS-BACE-1 Control flies were generated through the cross of Elav-Gal4 with w1118 (elav-Gal4/+genotype) we utilized four concentrations of the extract: 0.1 mg/mL These concentrations were diluted using 0.01% Tween as the vehicle Each concentration was added to 5 g of enriched puree medium The treatment was administered to the flies from 0 to 3 days post-eclosion Alongside the groups of flies tested for each concentration (N = 90) we also included groups subjected to water (control) and 0.01% Tween (vehicle) for comparison we employed 90 male and female AD-like flies each subjected to the treatments described earlier and we recorded the number of deceased flies every 2 days until the entire population expired we exclusively used male AD-like and control flies The flies were positioned on a suitable support capable of accommodating 12 vials During the pre-test (acclimatization phase) the flies were exposed to light in a quiet environment for 20 min the support containing the vials was tapped against the bench three times after which the climbing activity of the flies up to 5 cm in four seconds was observed This process was repeated and recorded five times with a 1-min interval between each repetition We evaluated the climbing ability of the flies at 5 Video analysis was conducted using QuickTime Player 7.7.9 software For the phytochemical prospection test and antioxidant activity assays statistical analyses and graphics were performed using GraphPad Prism 8.0 software Data were expressed as mean ± standard error of the mean (SEM) the results were submitted to one-way ANOVA with Tukey's test for multiple comparisons between sample means P values < 0.05 were considered significant it was evaluated whether the results had a normal distribution (parametric or non-parametric) using the D'Agostino and Pearson test All data generated or analyzed during this study are included in this published article Revolution of Alzheimer precision neurology Passageway of systems biology and neurophysiology Comprehensive review on Alzheimer’s disease: Causes and treatment Two-level diagnostic classification using cerebrospinal fluid YKL-40 in Alzheimer’s disease Proteolytic processing and cell biological functions of the amyloid precursor protein Gella, A. & Durany, N. Oxidative stress in Alzheimer disease. Cell Adhes. Migrat. https://doi.org/10.4161/cam.3.1.7402 (2009) Amyloid β-Peptide (1–42)-induced oxidative stress in Alzheimer disease: Importance in disease pathogenesis and progression Anti-neuroinflammatory potential of natural products in the treatment of Alzheimer ’ s disease The potential use of plant natural products and plant extracts with antioxidant properties for the prevention/treatment of neurodegenerative diseases: In vitro Natural compounds for Alzheimer’s disease therapy: A systematic review of preclinical and clinical studies Pollen composition and standardisation of analytical methods Biological and therapeutic properties of bee pollen: A review Bee pollen extracts modulate serum metabolism in lipopolysaccharide-induced acute lung injury mice with anti-inflammatory effects Stingless bee-collected pollen (bee bread): Chemical and microbiology properties and health benefits Bee pollen: Chemical composition and therapeutic application Drosophila melanogaster in the study of human neurodegeneration Evaluation of traditional medicines for neurodegenerative diseases using Drosophila models Characterization of a drosophila Alzheimer’s disease model: Pharmacological rescue of cognitive defects Pollen sources used by Tetragonisca angustula (Latreille Crop pollinators in Brazil: A review of reported interactions padrão polínico utilizado por Tetragonisca angustula latreille (Apidae: Meliponina) Pollen types collected by Tetragonisca angustula (hymenoptera: Apidae) in dry vegetation in northeastern Brazil Probiotic properties of bacteria isolated from bee bread of stingless bee Heterotrigona itama High species richness of native pollinators in Brazilian tomato crops [Alta riqueza de espécies de polinizadores nativos em plantações Brasileiras de tomateiro] Nesting ecology of stingless bees (Hymenoptera Meliponina) in urban areas: The importance of afforestation Nutritional composition and bioactive compounds of Melipona seminigra pot-pollen from Amazonas Characterization of phenolic compounds and antioxidative potential of pot-pollen produced by stingless bees (Tetragonula biroi Friese) from the Philippines Phytochemical composition and antioxidant activity of Tuscan bee pollen of different botanic origins Oxygen radical absorbance capacity (ORAC) and phenolic and anthocyanin concentrations in fruit and leaf tissues of highbush blueberry Jaboticaba peel and jaboticaba peel aqueous extract shows in vitro and in vivo antioxidant properties in obesity model Bioactive compounds and biological properties of Brazilian stingless bee honey have a strong relationship with the pollen floral origin A comprehensive review of stingless bee products: Phytochemical composition and beneficial properties of honey Quality of Brazilian stingless bee honeys: Cephalotrigona capitata/mombucão and Melipona scutellaris Latrelle/uruçu antioxidant and antimicrobial activity of propolis obtained from Melipona quadrifasciata quadrifasciata and Tetragonisca angustula stingless bees antioxidant capacity and physicochemical properties of Brazilian Apis mellifera honeys Metabolic engineering of flavonoids in tomato (Solanum lycopersicum): The potential for metabolomics Untargeted metabolomic analysis of tomato pollen development and heat stress response Flavonols control pollen tube growth and integrity by regulating ROS homeostasis during high-temperature stress The impact of fermentation on bee pollen polyphenolic compounds composition Bee pollen: Current status and therapeutic potential Nutrients and oxidative stress: Friend or foe? Microbial biodiversity in honey and pollen pots produced by Tetragonisca angustula (Jataí) Safety aspects of stingless bee pot-pollen from the Philippines Yeast communities associated with stingless bees a novel ascomycetous yeast species associated with stingless bees Extraction and determination of bioactive compounds from bee pollen The ameliorating effects of bee pollen on scopolamine-induced cognitive impairment in mice Differential gene expression by RNA-seq during Alzheimer’s disease-like progression in the Drosophila melanogaster model memory and neurocognitive performance: Relevance and potential implications for Alzheimer’s disease pathophysiology Effects of Ginkgo biloba administered after spatial learning on water maze and radial arm maze performance in young adult rats Antioxidant activity and phenolic compositions of lentil (Lens culinaris var Antidiabetic potential of Bauhinia forficata Link leaves: A non-cytotoxic source of lipase and glycoside hydrolases inhibitors and molecules with antioxidant and antiglycation properties The ferric reducing ability of plasma (FRAP) as a measure of ‘antioxidant power’: The FRAP assay Assays for hydrophilic and lipophilic antioxidant capacity (oxygen radical absorbance capacity (ORACFL)) of plasma and other biological and food samples Phytoscreening of Vochysiaceae species: Molecular identification by HPLC-ESI-MS/MS and evaluating of their antioxidant activity and inhibitory potential against human α-amylase and protein glycation Dnr1 mutations cause neurodegeneration in Drosophila by activating the innate immune response in the brain Download references This work was supported by the Foundation for Research Support of the Minas Gerais State-FAPEMIG (Grant # PPM-00503-18), and the National Institute of Science and Technology in Theranostics and Nanobiotechnology-INCT-TeraNano (CNPq grant # 465669/2014-0, http://www.teranano.ufu.br/) FSE received scholarship grants from CNPq (PQ-Research productivity Foued Salmen Espindola & Carlos Ueira-Vieira Natalia Carine Lima dos Santos & Rafael Martins de Oliveira Natalia Carine Lima dos Santos & Carlos Ueira-Vieira R.R.F.; H.C.G.S.; M.H.S.; T.S.R.; R.M.O.; T.N.A.; S.C.A.; F.S.E The authors declare no competing interests Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations Download citation DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-023-51091-3 Anyone you share the following link with will be able to read this content: a shareable link is not currently available for this article Sign up for the Nature Briefing newsletter — what matters in science O endereço abaixo não existe na globo.com Metrics details Taxonomic identification of triatomines is generally performed based on aspects of their external morphology considering morphological aspects of the external genitalia especially for similar and/or cryptic species The rupestral species Triatoma jatai Gonçalves et al. have been found naturally infected with Trypanosoma cruzi (Chagas representing a risk of new outbreaks of Chagas disease This study presents morphological description complementation of these species with an emphasis on the structures of the female external genitalia costalimai (n = 10 of each) were captured in the Brazilian municipalities of Paranã and Aurora do Tocantins and were identified with the use of a dichotomous key for the Matogrossensis subcomplex The females were cut transversely at the sixth abdominal segment and examined under scanning electron microscopy (SEM) at the Oswaldo Cruz/Fiocruz Institute Electronic Microscopy Platform It was possible to differentiate the three species based on the characteristics of urotergites VII morphological differences in the spines present on gonapophysis 8 in triatomines are described here for the first time The results show that external genitalia of females are useful structures to differentiate T SEM analysis contributes to and corroborates together with other tools morphological and molecular The highest number of acute cases of the disease in Brazil from 2000 to 2017 was recorded in the northern region where two of the species analyzed in this study 2013 and Triatoma costalimai Verano & Galvão Chagas outbreaks from oral transmission highlight the importance of entomological surveillance The present examined the external genitalia of T williami using scanning electron microscopy (SEM) with the aim to provide complementary data to the morphological characterization of these three species that could be useful for identification as well as to further integrative studies to allow a better species delimitation within the Matogrossensis subcomplex the fine morphological characterization of the female genitalia could be a source of putative new characters to be used in future phylogenetic studies to allow a better comprehension of the evolutionary history of this group of vectors they were metallized with gold and examined under a JSM 6390 LV (JEOL USA Inc. USA) scanning electron microscope at the Oswaldo Cruz/FIOCRUZ Institute Electronic Microscopy Platform Electromicrographs of the external genitalia of female Triatoma spp g Median region of gonapophysis 8 (Gc8) in Triatoma jatai in detail: single-pointed (a′) bifurcated (b′) and trifurcated (c′); h Triatoma costalimai and trifurcated (c′); i Triatoma williami in detail with single-pointed spines A summary of main morphological characteristics of the external female genitalia of T. jatai, T. costalimai and T. williami in dorsal and ventral view are show in Table 1 Expanding understanding of the characteristics that differentiate related species is important for a more accurate diagnosis and can facilitate entomological surveillance and control of vector transmission of Chagas disease especially in municipalities in the south and southeast Tocantins region such as Paranã and Aurora do Tocantins together with other morphological and molecular studies It may also help to evaluate the reproductive compatibility between T costalimai and the possible formation of hybrids under artificial conditions These analyses are underway in order to fully contemplate all definitions of biological species The datasets used and/or analyzed during the present study are available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request National and International Reference Laboratory in Triatomine Taxonomy Remote Attendance System of the Ministry of the Environment Chagas disease in the Americas: a review of the current public health situation and a vision for the future Washington: Pan American Health Organization and World Health Organization; 2018 Acute Chagas disease and spatial distribution of triatomines of epidemiological importance Revision of the Triatominae (Hemiptera: Reduviidae) and their significance as vectors of Chagas disease Zoological series: identification guides and manuals Curitiba: Brazilian Society of Zoology; 2015 The male genitalia and its importance in taxonomy Atlas dos Vetores da Doença de Chagas nas Américas Characterization of the external female genitalia of six species of Triatominae (Hemiptera: Reduviidae) by scanning electron microscopy Brazil (Hemiptera: Reduviidae: Triatominae) Mitochondrial genes reveal Triatoma jatai as a sister species to Triatoma costalimai (Reduviidae: Triatominae) New arrangements on several species subcomplexes of Triatoma genus based on the chromosomal position of ribosomal genes (Hemiptera: Triatominae) Triatoma costalimai (Hemiptera: Reduviidae) in and around houses of Tocantins State Molecular phylogeny of Triatomini (Hemiptera: Reduviidae: Triatominae) Drivers of house invasion by sylvatic Chagas disease vectors in the Amazon-Cerrado transition: a multi-year state-wide assessment of municipality-aggregated surveillance data Triatoma costalimai naturally infected by Trypanosoma cruzi: a public health concern First report of occurrence of Triatoma williami Galvão 1965 naturally infected with Trypanosoma cruzi Chagas evolution and species groups within the Triatominae Trapping sylvatic Triatominae (Reduviidae) in hollow trees Técnicas e métodos para utilização prática em microscopia (Hemiptera: Reduviidae: Triatominae) from the state of Rondônia Study of the external female genitalia of 14 Rhodnius species (Hemiptera Triatominae) using scanning electron microscopy A new species of Rhodnius from Brazil (Hemiptera: Reduviidae: Triatominae) External female genitalia of six species od the genus Meccus (Hemiptera: Reduviidae: Triatominae) Morphology of the terminal abdominal segments in females of Triatominae (Insecta: Hemiptera: Reduviidae) (Hemiptera: Reduviidae: Triatominae) from Pará State Triatoma brasiliensis species complex: characterization of the external female genitalia Anatomy of the spermatophore in triatomines (Hemiptera Triatominae) and its applications to the study of Chagas disease vector biology Download references The authors acknowledge Anália Celencina Fagundes Gomes Chagas disease manager of Secretaria de Saúde do Estado do Tocantins SES-TO for logistical support and the Electron Microscopy Plattform of the Oswaldo Cruz Institute Secretaria do Estado de Saúde do Tocantins Laboratório Interdisciplinar de Vigilância Entomológica em Diptera e Hemiptera Catarina Macedo Lopes & Jacenir Reis dos Santos-Mallet Centro Nacional de Diagnóstico e Investigación en Endemo-Epidemias (CeNDIE) Administración Nacional de Laboratorios e Institutos de Salud “Dr Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas (CONICET) TCMG and JRSM conceived and designed the experiments All authors read and approved the final manuscript The authors declare that they have no competing interests ALCF is a member of the “Consejo Nacional de Ciencia y Técnica de la República Argentina” (CONICET) Researcher’s Career unless otherwise stated in a credit line to the data Download citation DOI: https://doi.org/10.1186/s13071-020-04418-2 — Battle Creek officers found a man accused of kidnapping and shooting at his ex-girlfriend hiding in the back of a cargo van Tuesday 26-year-old Jatai Nicholas-Rafano Cummings in the area of Greenwood Avenue and Oneita Street according to the Battle Creek Police Department Cummings allegedly forced a 29-year-old woman at gunpoint from her apartment on Taft Court into a white Chevy Malibu she walked to a third home on Chestnut Street and Sherman Road allegedly began to yell at her and fired a shot Cummings was taken to Calhoun County Jail on charges of kidnapping Human-caused air pollution in Brazil’s São Paulo state is taking its toll on native bees, but the presence of plants can help ameliorate those effects, a new study shows Researchers from the University of São Paulo (USP) and São Paulo State University (UNESP) studied jataí bees (Tetragonisca angustula) as bioindicators of environmental quality — proverbial canaries in the coal mine — to confirm a direct relationship between the amount of vegetation and air pollution Plants act as a filter and a protective barrier and the larger the green area in ​​a given region the lower the levels of pollutants in the environment ​​and given that bees are the main pollinators in the animal kingdom responsible for pollinating 75% of all farmed plants worldwide The study measured accumulated levels of 21 chemical elements in the tissues of jataí bees collected in eight areas in São Paulo state where remnants of the Atlantic Forest still stand These areas had forest cover ranging from 16-70% and varying types and levels of human activity and presence “The distinguishing feature of our work is that our bioindicators were a group of bees that had not been studied on a global scale and are widely distributed in Brazil occurring both in urban areas and in preserved areas,” says study author Marcela de Matos Barbosa Barbosa says that when the bees fly through different environments to collect pollen they can carry fine particles of atmospheric aerosols from the surrounding pollution The study shows that bees living in more forested areas have lower levels of mercury The main source for heavy metals such as cadmium and chromium are the agrochemicals used on farms The study also shows how different types of land use influence the presence of the pollutants found in the bees The findings add to a growing body of evidence about the importance of mitigation projects such as afforestation in urban areas says study coordinator Milton Cezar Ribeiro a professor at UNESP’s Biosciences Institute According to Ribeiro, urban ecology is a field that’s been growing recently in academia. It addresses the creation of urban ecological corridors from an ecological and socio-environmental perspective “We created a tool to simulate the best scenarios within a human and non-human context where certain groups of plants are selected according to the routes to connect the city center to the outskirts,” he says Ribeiro says taking care of landscapes separately without connecting them isn’t enough as well as encouraging the use of vegetation in houses Giuliano Locosselli, a biologist at the USP Biosciences Institute and author of a pioneering study published in 2019 that showed how pollution in the city of São Paulo impacts tree growth says it’s also important to select the right plant species to create urban ecological corridors “Some trees are more resistant to pollution while others are less resistant The question today is to know which ones are what,” Locosselli says “We are trying to answer this question under a larger project that is part of a major international consortium focused on nature-based solutions The idea is to help municipalities and decision-makers to build more efficient and resilient urban forests.” Public policies and law enforcement, however, have been major obstacles to progress on this front. In the city of São Paulo, for example, a law proposed in 2009 mandated that the entire public bus fleet running on diesel should switch to clean fuels by 2018 and diesel emissions are now responsible for almost 95% of particulate matter — the most toxic pollutant to human health Cases like this are among the reasons why air pollution is today the world’s top cause of illness and death from chronic non-communicable diseases responsible for 40% of deaths from heart attacks and 50% of cases of pneumonia in children Air pollution is also considered the top reason for infant mortality in addition to being responsible for 6% of cases of lung cancer Evangelina Vormittag, former technical director of the microbiology laboratory at USP’s medical school and founder and director of Instituto Saúde e Sustentabilidade (Institute of Health and Sustainability) says these figures are a tragedy playing out in real time with the government lacking the political will to make a meaningful change “Brazil needs governments with the strength and courage to make the necessary change and that requires confronting economic forces,” she says there is a 20-plus-year-old law that mandates vehicle inspection throughout Brazil together with more than 20 other organizations under the Coalizão Respirar (Breathe Coalition) filed a lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of the criteria adopted by Brazil’s National Council for the Environment (CONAMA) for establishing air quality standards the WHO has determined concentration levels of pollutants that are safe for health We are now in 2021 and the levels we take as legal are three times higher than what the World Health Organization recommends,” Vormittag says which are responsible for managing air quality The air is polluted and they say it’s normal And nobody warns the population about it.” She points out that none of the nine states that make up the Brazilian Amazon monitors their air quality Their failure to do so is something that Vormittag describes as catastrophic “In the Amazon there is neither measurement nor assessment “The levels of pollution by particulate matter in areas with fires are similar to China’s.” Barbosa, M. D., Fernandes, A. C., Alves, R. S., Alves, D. A., Barbosa Junior, F., Batista, B. L., … Hornos Carneiro, M. F. (2021). Effects of native forest and human-modified land covers on the accumulation of toxic metals and metalloids in the tropical bee Tetragonisca angustula. Ecotoxicology and Environmental Safety, 215, 112147. doi:10.1016/j.ecoenv.2021.112147 Locosselli, G. M., Camargo, E. P., Moreira, T. C., Todesco, E., Andrade, M. F., André, C. D., … Buckeridge, M. S. (2019). The role of air pollution and climate on the growth of urban trees. Science of the Total Environment, 666, 652-661. doi:10.1016/j.scitotenv.2019.02.291 Banner image of a jataí bee by Cristiano Menezes This story was reported by Mongabay’s Brazil team and first published here on our Brazil site on Dec Honey bees find food more easily in cities, thanks to abundant urban gardens The “fortress conservation” model is under pressure in East Africa as protected areas become battlegrounds over history and global efforts to halt biodiversity loss Mongabay’s Special Issue goes beyond the region’s world-renowned safaris to examine how rural communities and governments are reckoning with conservation’s colonial origins and trying to forge a path forward […] A study by Brazilian and United Kingdom researchers that was published in PNAS showed that the sole purpose of guard jataí bees is to defend the hive Scientists originally believed that only ants and termites had individuals adapted exclusively for defense A study published in PNAS showed that the sole purpose of guard jataí bees is to defend the hive Agência FAPESP – A new study has revealed that among the jataí bees (Tetragonisca angustula) there are individuals physically adapted to perform a single function: defending the hive scientists thought that the division of tasks in colonies was based solely on the age of the bees and that all bees but queen bees performed a variety of tasks conducted by scientists in Brazil and the United Kingdom was published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) the existence of specialized and physically adapted castes is a well-known function and is described in the literature this is a new fact,” says Cristiano Menezes researcher at Embrapa Amazônia Oriental and one of the authors of the article The study, conducted in partnership with researchers at the University of Sussex, is one of the results of the Thematic Project “Biodiversity and sustainable uses of pollinators, with emphasis on Meliponini bees,” conducted under the auspices of the BIOTA-FAPESP project and coordinated by Professor Vera Lúcia Imperatriz Fonseca “We conducted another study with jataí bees to try to understand how they identify whether or not an individual belongs to the colony That’s when we noticed that the guards were much larger than the others It was shocking because the difference was noticeable to the naked eye,” states Menezes Laboratory tests not only confirm that soldier bees are 30% heavier than foragers but also revealed the morphological differences between the two castes “We discovered that foragers have a larger head We also saw differences in the size of the thorax and the wings It is possible that these physical variations are connected to the activities that each bee executes Foragers leave the colony to search for food and must memorize the route home but soldiers benefit from larger legs to attack the enemy and immobilize them with propolis “New studies are needed to confirm this hypothesis,” affirms Menezes The researchers also verified a subdivision within the soldier bees Some soldiers guard the entrance to the colony whereas others fly over the site and monitor the arrival of enemies this caste represents just 1% of the colony – between 30 to 50 individuals – enough to meet the demands for defense such as the iratim species (Lestrimelitta limao) These insects normally invade the hives of other species to steal honey as the researchers stressed in the article scientists analyzed how these soldiers behave when attacked by a robber bee we caught an iratim and placed it in front of a colony of jataís the guards that flew over the hive bit the wings of the invader temporarily impeding it from flying,” tells Menezes As the invading bees are larger and stronger than the jataí the longer the fight lasted and the more time the colony had to prepare for the invasion When the arrival of enemies was noted with substantial advance warning the soldier bees managed to prevent the pillaging they blocked the entrance to the hive with resins leaving all the bees confined for two days “Our hypothesis is that the successive attacks of robber bees were the major evolutionary force for the jataí’s development of a caste specialized in defense,” says Menezes “Very specialized individuals cannot perform other tasks if needed to meet the momentary needs of the colony,” he explains the division of labor is based on the age of bees Scientists call this division “age polyethism.” The younger operators perform internal functions producing cells where they will house larvae and they finally become guards and foragers they have already performed all the other functions The loss to the colony is reduced,” explained Menezes which are also known as bees without stingers This tribe was the focus of the Thematic Project coordinated by Imperatriz Fonseca and concluded in 2010 The page you are looking for might have been removed 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Send a note to us at hello@sports360az.com. Website Developed & Managed by   SynergyTop Inc Please press and hold the button until it turns completely green If you believe this is an error, please contact our support team 147.45.197.102 : 1235bc9e-ed9c-49ee-8a5a-33b40056 When we think of bees, we don’t always recognize the huge diversity of species they represent. Almost all the honey we consume comes from western honey bees (Apis mellifera), a hybrid of European and African species. But there are another 20,000 different bee species in the world. Brazil alone has more than 300 The country has the world’s greatest diversity of this type of bee The importance of Brazil’s stingless bees is increasingly being acknowledged since agricultural crops of high economic value depend on pollination by these insects And beekeeping helps conservation: Keepers of Melipona usually preserve local ecosystems and restore areas used in their activity since native Brazilian bees depend on a healthy habitat to reproduce Places that maintained the culture of native beekeeping can now make this an alternative for income generation,” says Jerônimo Villas-Bôas author of a manual that addresses practices associated with stingless beekeeping in Brazil In the fine dining sector, Brazilian honey has already reached the kitchens of well-known chefs whose São Paulo restaurant has two Michelin stars wax and royal jelly — have been known for centuries who lived among the Tupinambá people on the coast of what is today São Paulo state mention three native bees used by indigenous people for medicine and food purposes — probably mandaçaia (Melipona quadrifasciata) mandaguari (Scaptotrigona postica) and jataí-amarela (Tetragonisca angustula) I tested honey from three stingless bee species: jataí canudo [Scaptotrigona depilis] and borá [Tetragona elongata]” in entomology from the University of São Paulo (USP) the honeys had antimicrobial effects against several pathogens that may cause diseases in humans.” Native beekeeping is currently expanding in Brazil for purposes ranging from scientific research to community-based honey production “Beekeepers seek areas with preserved vegetation,” Villas-Bôas says “Stingless beekeeping enables us to conserve the species involved and other animals in the ecosystem such as birds and mammals.” more than 75% of crops intended for human consumption depend on pollination Most plant species, whether cultivated or native, are pollinated by animals such as bats, moths, butterflies, wasps, beetles — and mainly bees. The Brazilian Platform for Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (BPBES) estimates the value of the environmental pollination service for food production in the country at about 43 billion reais ($8 billion) per year accounting for 44 cultivated and wild plants Certain plant species are pollinated only by Brazilian stingless bees “They are chiefly responsible for pollinating native vegetation which guarantees variability in plant species,” says Generosa Sousa Ribeiro from the Melipona Beekeeping Department at the State University of Southwest Bahia (UESB) the acerola cherry depends on solitary bees of the Centris genus.” Evidence shows that establishing stingless bee colonies in agricultural areas has positive effects on production of coffee pollination by the iraí bee (Nannotrigona testaceicornis) reduces fruit deformation And a study shows that the uruçu-nordestina bee (Melipona scutellaris) plays a major role in orange tree pollination “The more we know about Brazilian stingless bees, the more important they become,” says Juliana Feres, a researcher and founding partner of Heborá a platform that focuses on improving production of Brazilian honey by rural women Stingless bees also provide a specialized service known as buzz pollination can vibrate by contracting their thoracic muscles thus releasing pollen from the flowers and benefiting crops such as tomatoes and eggplants native stingless bees face a paradox: while they are important for agricultural activity “Our food production system is the main reason why bees are disappearing,” Villas-Bôas says “Plant suppression affects their natural habitat uniform landscapes do not provide the diverse diet that insects need hamper their ability to return to the hive among other harmful effects that end up weakening or even decimating the hive “The populations [of stingless species] are much smaller than those of A which makes it difficult to reorganize these bees after continued spraying we collected samples in areas of mass spraying and we found more than 10 pesticides that were lethal for native bees,” says Ribeiro from UESB A 2018 publication by Brazil’s environmental protection agency, known as IBAMA, calls for more specific studies that are not restricted to a single species Other works have since followed. A study conducted by researchers at São Paulo State University (UNESP) and published in 2019 assessed the effect of dimethoate which is used as an international reference in toxicity tests It showed that the dosage to kill 50% of a population of uruçu-nordestina larvae is 320 times lower than the dosage that kills an equal percentage of A Also in 2019, at the University of São Paulo’s Luiz de Queiroz Higher School of Agriculture (Esalq-USP), another study showed that thiamethoxam and three other insecticides from the neonicotinoid group may cause behavioral changes in adult jataí bees such as reducing flight speed and  distance traveled A 2016 article focused on S postica showed that the active ingredient imidacloprid affecting its ability to recognize food and restraining its movements in the field The latest edition of the report was published in December 2019 Loss of pollinators in an ecosystem may be irreversible and nothing is known about the possibility of natural recolonization “Brazil’s bees have co-evolved with its native flora for a long time,” Duarte says “Each plant has adapted to the benefits that some species provided to its reproduction bees have adapted to specific resources such as nectar Brazilian flora and native bees are highly dependent on each other.” Banner image of jataí-amarela (Tetragonisca angustula), one of the best-known native stingless bees from Brazil, by Letícia Smania Donanzan via Flickr (CC BY 2.0) states are establishing quality guidelines that differ from those used with Apis mellifera Léo Ramos Chaves / Pesquisa FAPESP Magazine a dark-brown-bodied stingless bee 10 millimeters (mm) in length produces honey that exudes an aroma of cheese The uruçu-amarela from the Amazon (Melipona flavolineata) produces honey with a sourish taste The honey from uruçu-cinzenta (Melipona fasciculata) and tastes increases the culinary uses of honey from native bees complicates the definition of parameters for the quality and identity of each type state governments are creating legislations to remedy shortcomings in federal laws and promote meliponiculture—stingless bee keeping—regulated in 2004 and updated in 2020 The only federal regulation in place about honey from bees a hybrid species of foreign origin predominant in Brazil also known as Africanized bees because of the differences in the composition between the honeys,” states biologist Cristiano Menezes from the Brazilian Agricultural Research Corporation (EMBRAPA) He is one of the authors of an article published in 2021 in the scientific journal Apidologie the honeys from native bees surpass the limits of several quality parameters adopted by the Brazilian legislation for Apis Of the 106 samples used to define the physical-chemical composition of the stingless bee honeys analyzed in other studies 82 presented a level of humidity above the 20% limit set in Brazilian legislation Due to naturally having more water than that of the Africanized bee native bee honey can have between 18% and 40% humidity 30% of the samples had free acidity values above that set by the federal legislation “The acidity level indicates fermentation it makes sense because it can indicate premature collection ferment naturally in the colonies,” says Menezes the acidity index varies between 17 milliequivalents per kilogram (mEq/kg) of mandaçaia (Melipona quadrifasciata) honey and 143 mEq/kg of Amazonian uruçu-amarela honey The limit established in the national legislation is 50 mEq/kg some states have approved their own technical regulations regarding identity and quality for native bee honey The state of Amazonas has increased the acidity limit to 80 mEq/kg The regulation for São Paulo raised the humidity level for natural honey to 40% but kept the standard of 50 mEq/kg for acidity Léo Ramos Chaves / Pesquisa FAPESP MagazineBorá (Tetragona clavipes): its honey exudes an aroma of cheeseLéo Ramos Chaves / Pesquisa FAPESP Magazine “With the main guidelines established and a technical standard approved details such as acidity can be changed later with scientific justification,” assesses biologist Ricardo Camargo researcher at EMBRAPA and coauthor of an article published in the Brazilian Journal of Food Technology in 2017 from which the creation of the technical standard for São Paulo was founded “The important thing is that it discovered that the acidity index for native bees can be higher than for Apis The next stage is to recognize the tolerable minimum and maximum levels for the main parameters Camargo was a technical consultant for the Sectorial Chamber of the Honey and Bee Product Production Chain of the Brazilian Ministry of Agriculture the chamber proposed the production of a national technical standard to MAPA taking the one from São Paulo as a model,” he says According to the minutes of the last sectorial chamber meeting it will be necessary to make technical standards for propolis cerumen [pots where the native bees store the honey] and other products from stingless bees.” Menezes adds: “Cerumen adds quality to the honey native beekeeper and author of a technical manual about full use of stingless bee products comments that the lack of national parameters and standardization between state legislations complicates the sale of honey outside the region it was produced “If the states are creating their standards the federal government could also do it,” he affirms Villas-Bôas took part in drafting the technical standard for Pará published in November 2021 by the Pará Agricultural Defense Agency (ADEPARÁ) breeding of stingless bees is 30 times higher than that of Apis Artisanal activity Among the 250 species of native bees described in Brazil and aromas results from the production method: native bees store the honey in pots made from a mixture of wax and propolis whereas Apis store their honey in honeycomb made from pure wax a colony of stingless bees such as uruçu-cinzenta produces an average of 4 kg per year with an average price of R$30 per kilogram Practiced for hundreds of years by the native peoples of Brazil meliponiculture is a predominantly artisanal activity “The registration of producers in the official agencies is still low which complicates more detailed knowledge of the market,” says economist Ana Assad executive director of the Brazilian Association of Bee Studies (ABELHA) each state regulates its registration and registers stingless bee keepers,” observes Camargo who also belongs to the Association of Native Stingless Beekeepers of the State of São Paulo (AMESAMPA) there are between 4,000 and 5,000 stingless beekeepers in the state attracted 45,000 people at the start of the pandemic in the Catálogo nacional das abelhas nativas sem-ferrão (National catalog of native stingless bees) the Chico Mendes Institute for Biodiversity Conservation (ICMBio) presented the natural areas of occurrence of 95 species of this group and stressed that each one should be kept in its own region © Revista Pesquisa FAPESP - All rights reserved shares his people’s sacred story in a mix of Portuguese and Guarani as he walks along a path in the rainforest These are places where people should never interfere,” says the Indigenous Guarani leader as he moves deeper into the forest until the sound of cars or a little more than a mile away in the city and in recent decades has been subject to invasions and real estate speculation not to mention the constant struggle with one of the world’s largest cities for every square centimeter of land the 125 Indigenous families living in the six villages inside Jaraguá decided in 2017 to join forces in planting native Atlantic Rainforest seedlings and bringing back indigenous bees the Jaraguá Guarani proudly sustain a meliponário with 300 hives that house nine native bee species the return of native bees considered sacred by many ethnic groups in Brazil has also brought back an important part of the Guarani ancestral way of living This includes naming ceremonies using candles made from native beeswax and the production of various incenses to treat depression and mental illnesses “The indigenous bees have helped us recover ancestral knowledge that uses the honey and wax for medicines but had never been able to use them because the native bees had all died off in Jaraguá,” Werá Mirim says the making of traditional handicrafts was one of the few ancestral activities that remained for the people in the Jaraguá Indigenous Territory Confined to this reservation squeezed between the Bandeirantes and Anhanguera freeways and cut in two by the Jaraguá Tourist Route the São Paulo Guarani are unable to carry out ancestral practices like hunting and fishing “It’s really hard for Indigenous people not to be able to swim in a river calms the spirit and strengthens our traditions we now have more flowers in the springtime and our agroforest is more productive,” Werá Mirim says a professor at São Paulo State University’s (UNESP) Center for the Study of Social Insects (CEIS) says indigenous bees produce less honey than non-native species yet are important pollinators for the native plants “Some native Brazilian flowers can only be pollinated by indigenous bees Africanized bees disrupt the work of indigenous bees by removing the pollen from the passionflowers without being able to pollinate them,” Malaspina says He points to studies showing how native bee colonies can increase agricultural production in Brazil and generate larger fruits in greater quantities “We would be able to increase soybean production in Brazil by 18% without cutting down a single square centimeter of rainforest just because of the pollination power of native bees melons … just to name a few crops,” he says When one imagines an apiary full of bees ready to sting anyone that comes close “peace” isn’t exactly the word that comes to mind opening a cedar box that’s home to a hive of thousands of tiny “Indigenous bees aren’t violent like the Africanized ones so the most they can do is get tangled up in your hair.” Werá Mirim uses no special clothes or gloves to handle the hive often informally called “killer bees,” are a hybrid of various subspecies of the western honey bee (Apis mellifera) During the European colonization of South America Catholic priests introduced European bees to Brazil for their wax so that they could make candles and apiculture spread throughout the region over the years But because the European subspecies aren’t very strong honey producers a teacher brought East African lowland honey bees to Brazil in 1956 just one-eighth of the original forest cover remains A study published this past February in the journal Environmental Pollution shows that native bees are also more sensitive to pesticides than stinging bees “The native bee species are greatly dependent on preservation of the rainforests where they live so they can build their hives,” Malaspina says “If a colony is removed from the tree where it is installed This is why we have a law prohibiting the removal of hives from nature There are ways of collecting them with bait that don’t interfere with the environment.” which involves placing natural bait inside plastic bottles hanging from tree trunks in the rainforest to attract the insects he removes it from the tree and transfers it nest to a cedar box adapted for the native bees to be able to build out their hive The idea of creating a meliponário in the Jaraguá Indigenous Territory began with Márcio Werá Mirim’s cousin a xondaro (warrior) and one of the guardians of the territory Werá Mirim was living in the state of Espírito Santo in the coastal Tupiniquim Indigenous Territory he learned how to raise bees from his uncles Guarani family members from all over Brazil frequently exchange seeds and plants to ensure that important species in their food traditions don’t disappear from the Indigenous territories “I went to visit the village in Espírito Santo I looked out into the backyard and saw Márcio with his shirt off and a bunch of bees surrounding him ‘He’s really lost it,’ I thought to myself It was then that I learned about the stinger-free bees,” says Tiago Karai who until then didn’t know how important native bees had been to his people “Because our culture is transmitted orally from the older generations to the younger ones the native bee tradition had disappeared together with the Atlantic Rainforest,” he adds Karai became fascinated with the indigenous bees and convinced his cousin to return to the Jaraguá Indigenous Territory to teach his São Paulo family members how to raise these species This was also a time when the territory was suffering invasions from land grabbers along one of its borders compelling the Indigenous residents to migrate along the border to establish new villages and guarantee the protection of their land “We physically surround the territory to keep land grabbers from coming in wanting to build housing developments,” Karai says This was how the village of Tekoá Yvy Porã was formed nearly 10 years ago just a few meters off the busy Jaraguá Tourist Route the city’s highest landmark and a popular destination The community built its seedling greenhouse right on the shoulder of the tourist route So Márcio Werá Mirim returned to the Jaraguá Indigenous Territory in 2017 developed native beekeeping workshops for the children living in the territory Since his return and the arrival of the native bees the village’s prayer house has become its busiest meeting place “We make the sacred body paint that we use in our ceremony from the jataí bees We also have the ‘honey ceremony’ in which we sing and pray to be purified Other species are used for smoke ceremonies that help people with mental problems like depression,” Werá Mirim says The meliponário is also said to have brought greater spiritual protection to the homes in the community or if there are children who cry too much there we place candles made from the wax from our bees to send the bad spirits away,” Werá Mirim says whose eucalyptus plantations had crossed the borders into the Indigenous territory “Family members from many parts of the country moved to the Tupiniquim territory to help We cut down all the eucalyptus trees that had been planted on Indigenous land and The 14,325 hectares of self-demarcated land claimed by the Tupiniquim and Guarani were only ratified by the government in 2010 part of the land they’d reclaimed had already been rendered unproductive That’s when we started raising the indigenous Atlantic Rainforest bees that had disappeared from the region because of deforestation,” Werá Mirim says nor had he been aware of their importance to the Guarani people After the land was reclaimed from Aracruz and the native bees brought back with rivers to swim and fish in along the Espírito Santo coastline Márcio Werá Mirim says he rediscovered joy living there — something that had disappeared from the Jaraguá Indigenous Territory an area officially the size of two football fields making it the smallest Indigenous territory in Brazil but this addition is still awaiting ratification by the government.) and the bees to help my spirit stay there,” Werá Mirim says “This is because we believe that when a person becomes very sad their spirit has left the place and it’s very dangerous.” But his happiness in the Tupiniquim Indigenous Territory was short-lived: in 2015 the Mariana dam holding mining waste from iron ore miner Samarco (a subsidiary of Vale sending a torrent of contaminated mud 700 km (430 mi) down the Doce River Swimming and fishing in the rivers were no longer possible “I couldn’t see any perspective for being able to live well in Aracruz without being able to fish I came back with the bees,” Werá Mirim says There are 300 known regional species of indigenous bees living in Brazil “Even though they don’t sting and seem easy to handle many can’t work in cold weather so their owners need to know how to feed the hives artificially during the winter thousands of bees die at the hands of these people,” Malaspina says Hives of native species sell online today for as much as 2,000 reais ($400) which are the most common indigenous species moving native bee species to regions outside their original areas can spread illness in the environment people have discovered stinger-free bees and have begun to take them out of nature to raise at home as if they were pets without first understanding the environmental risks involved This story was reported by Mongabay’s Brazil team and first published here on our Brazil site on May 2 Lourencetti, A. P. S., Azevedo, P., Miotelo, L., Malaspina, O., & Nocelli, R. C. F. (2023). Surrogate species in pesticide risk assessments: Toxicological data of three stingless bees species. Environmental Pollution, 318, 120842. doi:10.1016/j.envpol.2022.120842 which is larger and heavier than other worker bees in its nest and defends the entrance has been identified in colonies of a Brazilian stingless bee known as a Jatai A team of researchers from Sussex University and the University of São Paulo studied the Jatai bee (Tetragonisca angustula) which lives in colonies of 10,000 individuals in cavity walls The study, published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences found that Jatai soldiers are 30% heavier than their forager nestmates They stand on the tube leading to the entrance of their nest to provide early warning of attack by robber bees which can kill entire colonies when raiding nests for food The new research shows that Jatai soldier bees are physically specialised to perform the task of protecting their nest mates Jatai soldier bees guard the entrance to their nest. Photograph: PNASFrancis Ratnieks, professor of apiculture at Sussex, one of the scientists involved in the study said: "The discovery is significant in term of the evolution of advanced insect societies Large-bodied soldier workers have long been known in ants and termites but this is the first evidence of a soldier bee – a worker physically designed for active defence of their nest." The Engagement Fellowship scheme - supported by the Social Sciences Division and funded by the Higher Education Innovation Fund (HEIF) - enables researchers to develop their engagement skills whilst building meaningful long-lasting partnerships; bringing valuable research insights to bear on real-world challenges and significantly growing their research impact partnerships and types of knowledge exchange activities the projects range from exploring responsible AI in a military context and supporting the development of the NHS digital health check programme to understanding the effectiveness of alternative delivery models for social programmes in fragile states and investigating how public procurement can help us to reach net-zero climate targets Each collaboration will see either a University of Oxford researcher embedded within their partner organisation for up to six months or colleagues from those organisations embedded at the University to facilitate deep and rich exchanges of expertise and ideas This has substantial benefits to the researchers partner organisations and their wider communities Professor Marina Jirotka (Lead Researcher) and Dr Carolyn Ten Holter (Engagement Fellow), Department of Computer Science, partnering with The British Army Dr Carolyn Ten Holter said: 'This engagement will strengthen the links between Defence and academia helping to map existing relationships focused on knowledge exchange and ensuring multidisciplinary approaches to challenges.' 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Please contact partnerships@sosci.ox.ac.uk or find out more how to Collaborate with Oxford's Social Sciences School of Anthropology and Museum Ethnography School of Archaeology Oxford School of Global and Area Studies Saïd Business School Department of Economics Department of Education School of Geography and the Environment Blavatnik School of Government Department of International Development Oxford Internet Institute Faculty of Law Department of Politics and International Relations Department of Social Policy and Intervention Department of Sociology The Oxford Martin School Accessibility statement Site Design: One Ltd The Bhiwani police have arrested three gangsters when they allegedly tried to loot a police vehicle near Mundhal village of Bhiwani district on Saturday night is a sharpshooter of the Sandeep Badwasni gang and he was wanted in the murder of two persons The police had announced a reward of Rs50,000 on his head Deputy Superintendent of Police (DSP) Virender Singh said Ajay and his two accomplices were planning to loot a vehicle near Talu Jatai village on the Bhiwani-Jind road When a police team on night vigil reached near Talu Jatai village the accused signaled them to stop and tried to snatch the vehicle The gangsters were overpowered after a brief chase The police said Ajay was involved in the murder of Rohtak advocate Satyawan Malik and youth Nanu in Barona village of Sonepat district in December 2012 30?"green-strip-scroll":""}">\n ${e.display_status||e.scheduleTime}\n 30?"green-strip-scroll":""}">\n ${e.display_status+" It was started by Sardar Dyal Singh Majithia and is run by a trust comprising five eminent persons as trustees.The Tribune the largest selling English daily in North India publishes news and views without any bias or prejudice of any kind rather than agitational language and partisanship It is an independent newspaper in the real sense of the term.The Tribune has two sister publications Punjabi Tribune (in Punjabi) and Dainik Tribune (in Hindi) Remembering Sardar Dyal Singh Majithia gleaming buildings rising from the cornfields on the Myanmar side of the Moei River are a sight so incredible that you find yourself blinking rapidly to make sure you're not imagining it a few crudely constructed concrete buildings and a long-running civil war that has turned this area of ​​Myanmar into one of the poorest places in the world It is called Shwe Koko or Golden Rainforest Tree It is said to be built on fraud and is home to lucrative but deadly scams is languishing in a Bangkok prison awaiting extradition to China the Shea Zhijiang company that built the city presents Shwe Koko in a very different light in promotional videos – as a resort city a safe holiday destination for Chinese tourists and a paradise for the super-rich The story of Shwe Koko is also a story of the unbridled ambition that has emerged from China over the past two decades She Zhijiang dreamed of building this dazzling city as a ticket out of the dark world of fraud and gambling in which he dwelt But in his desire to achieve such a lofty goal which is now determined to root out fraudulent operations along the Thai-Myanmar border that increasingly target ordinary Chinese Publicity about scams is hurting Thai tourism Thailand is cutting off electricity supplies to complexes across the border tightening banking rules and vowing to block visas for those suspected of using Thailand as a transit route Shwe Kok was left stranded in war-torn Myanmar after a coup unable to secure the influx of investment and visitors necessary for the city to function Yatai is trying to repair the city's notorious image by allowing journalists to visit hoping that more favorable coverage might even get Xia Zhijiang out of prison And that's why they invited the BBC to Shwe Koko As the civil war in Myanmar escalated after the 2021 coup you need to travel for three days from the country's commercial center of Yangon and the real risk of getting caught up in armed clashes Crossing from Thailand takes only a few minutes but requires careful planning to avoid Thai police and military patrols Shea Zhijiang's colleagues took us on a tour She believes in building a green city," they say who said he was a former police officer from Guangxi in southern China on what he insists were trumped-up fraud charges There he met Xia Zhijiang and became one of his most trusted lieutenants Shwe Koko looks like an ordinary provincial Chinese town The signs on the buildings are written in Chinese characters and the streets are constantly filled with columns of construction vehicles made in China they speak vaguely about the tenants of their buildings "Rich people from many countries rent villas," they tell us most of the people we saw were local Karen We saw very few foreign visitors who should be the main customers of the hotels and casinos Jatai claims there are no more scams in Shwe Koko The company has put up huge billboards across the city proclaiming and that "online companies" should go away But locals told us in confidence that fraudulent businesses still exist The fraudsters emerged a decade ago during the unbridled frenzy of Chinese investment in the Cambodian coast then moved to the lawless hills on Myanmar's border with China and have now settled along the Thai-Myanmar border the Myanmar military and various hastily cobbled together rebel armies and warlords are fighting for control of Karen State Fraud has grown into multi-billion dollar businesses They employ thousands of workers from China who are kept in fenced-off compounds where they defraud people from all over the world and take their savings while others are abducted and forced to work Those who managed to escape told harrowing stories of torture and beatings We managed to speak with a young woman who worked at one of the fraud centers a few weeks before our visit She didn't like it and was allowed to leave who contact potential victims in an attempt to build an intimate online relationship with them you look just like one of my friends.' Once you've made friends you encourage them further by sending pictures of you the conversation shifts to get-rich-quick schemes and the women then start claiming that they made a lot of money that way "People chatting will continue to exchange messages with the client convincing him to buy shares of the crypto company." we were only allowed to see what Jatai wanted us to see it was obvious that the scams had not stopped and were probably still the main business in the city Our request to see the interior of any of the newly constructed office buildings was denied We were led through the city by security members borrowed from the paramilitary force that controls this part of the border We were allowed to film the construction work and the exterior of the buildings Many of the windows had bars installed on the inside "Everyone in Shwe Kok knows what's going on there," said a young woman who used to work at the fraud center She rejected Jatai's claims that she no longer allows fraud centers to operate in Shwe Kok The whole city does it in those skyscrapers There's no way Jatai doesn't know about it." "I can say that Yatai would never accept telecom fraud and deception," said Xie Zhijiang during an interview from the Bangkok detention center where he is being held Yatai wanted us to hear it from She Zhijiang in person and arranged a shaky video link Only Wang could be seen talking to him; we had to stay out of sight of the prison guards and had to rely on Wang to relay our questions to him the small-town Chinese entrepreneur whom Beijing claims is the mastermind behind all criminal operations he dropped out of school at 14 and learned computer coding He appears to have moved to the Philippines in his early twenties and switched to online gambling he was convicted in a Chinese court for running an illegal lottery He invested in gambling companies in Cambodia and managed to obtain Cambodian citizenship he made a deal with Karen warlord Soe Chit Tu to build a new city together while So Chit Tu and his 8.000 armed fighters would provide security Jatai's flashy videos promised $15 billion in investment and described a promised land of skyscrapers Shwe Koko has been described as part of Xi Jinping's Belt and Road Initiative which brings resources and infrastructure to the world China publicly distanced itself from She Zhijiang in 2020 and the Myanmar government launched an investigation into Yatai who built far more than the 59 villas authorized by the investment permit and ran casinos before they were legalized in Myanmar acting on a Chinese request sent to Interpol Xie Zhijiang was arrested and imprisoned in Bangkok The British government also punished Zhijiang and his business partner So Chit Tu for their connection to human trafficking Xie Zhijiang claims that he was a victim of the Chinese state's double game He says he founded the Yatai company on the instructions of China's Ministry of State Security and insists that Shwe Koko was part of the Belt and Road Initiative at the time He accuses the Chinese Communist Party of turning against him because he refused to give them control of his project They wanted a colony on the Thai-Myanmar border China has denied any business ties to Xia Zhijiang While denying any illegal behavior by Yatai acknowledges the "high possibility" that fraudsters come to Shwe Koko to spend money "This is because Jatai City is completely open to anyone who wants to freely enter and exit." cannot stop the crooks from coming into and leaving the city it's hard to imagine any companies other than scammers that would choose to operate here And while Thailand is cutting off electricity and telecommunications the electricity is coming from diesel generators All communication takes place via Ilona Maska's Starlink satellite system Yatai's strategy is to "glamorize the project to create a narrative that Shwe Kok is a safe city," says Jason Tower who has spent years investigating fraudulent operations in Shwe Kok He says they could even "start moving the more notorious components of the fraud industry "What kind of legitimate business is going to come to Shwe Koko The economy will continue to be a scam economy." We were eventually allowed to peek inside a casino in Shwe Kok run by a friendly Australian who told us that he would be closing it soon gambling on a popular arcade game where they had to shoot digital fish We were forbidden from conducting any interviews The Australian manager said the casino – built six years ago – was popular and profitable when there were only one or two with at least nine of them actively working there simply aren't enough customers for them The real money is hidden in online gambling which he says is the main business in Shwe Kok It is impossible to know how much money is made from online gambling and how much through criminal activities such as money laundering and fraud When we asked Jatai how much money they made they wouldn't tell us – not even an approximate amount with very little revenue or turnover passing through them We declined Jatai's offer to visit the go-kart track while being taken to breakfast at Jatai's luxury hotel The only other facility we were allowed to check out was a karaoke club cave-like domes completely covered with digital screens on which huge tropical fish and sharks swam They also constantly played videos that highlighted the vision and virtues of She Zhijiang except for some young Chinese women who worked there They wore opera masks so they could not be identified and danced moodily to the music for several minutes before giving up and sitting down We were allowed to speak to the local staff member Karen but she was so intimidated by everything that we barely got more than her name out of her She Zhijiang left the leadership of Shwe Koko to a young protégé He lives with Wang Fugui in a spacious villa they built on the banks of the Moei River and is guarded by burly Chinese bodyguards eat the best food and drink the best drinks He has a slightly different explanation than his boss for the scams that continue to unfold under their noses "We are just construction investors," he said "I can guarantee you that those things don't happen here." Our job is just to provide good infrastructure good buildings and a supporting industry." But there is no legal system in this part of Myanmar It is ruled by various armed groups that control various parts of the territory along the Thai border Their commanders decide who is allowed to build or run businesses taking a percentage of what they have to help finance their wars either among themselves or against the Myanmar military Many of them are known to harbor impostor complexes He admitted that the war had allowed Jatai to obtain land very cheaply Karen human rights groups accuse Soa Chit Tu of expelling the original settlers from their land although it is clear that Jatai also provides much-needed jobs for the locals The lawlessness in Karen State attracts illegal businesses the most – and that doesn't help Shwe Koko's image Neither do recent headlines in the newspapers 22-year-old Chinese actor Wang Xing was rescued from a border fraud center after being lured to Thailand with an offer to film a film His disappearance triggered a barrage of questions on Chinese social media prompting Thai and Chinese authorities to launch a joint operation to free him Chinese tourists have begun canceling vacations in Thailand The BBC has received emails from some of the victims of the scams pleading for help; rescue organisations believe thousands are still trapped there Almost all of them are located in smaller complexes along the border south of Shwe Kok Jatai pointed out that their construction efforts are not the same as these simple complexes some of which are mere piles of huts built in forest clearings All the bad things are happening there now a notorious complex south of the border town of Myawaddy a cluster of low-rise buildings run by a prominent Chinese mobster named Wan Kuok Koi That distinction did not help She Zhijiang who once had good connections with politicians police chiefs and even a minor member of the royal family in Thailand it seems he has lost even the influence he once had in prison in order to buy himself special privileges He complained that he had recently been beaten by guards His lawyers have appealed the Interpol red notice under which he was arrested but China's voice is probably the strongest in determining his fate it seemed to us that Shi Zhijiang was genuinely disgusted by his sudden reversal of fortune but now I really understand how awful it is when your human rights are threatened," he says "It is hard to imagine how much the human rights of ordinary people are oppressed in China when the human rights and dignity of a respected businessman like me who attended the same state banquets as Xi Jinping It seems he truly believed he could build something that would one day transcend Shwe Koko's dismal origins as a city of fraud It's hard to predict what will happen to this city now but if the Thai and Chinese governments continue to crack down on fraud BBC is in Serbian from now on and on YouTube, follow us HERE. Follow us on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube i Viber Brazil wrote a letter to his neighbours begging to be saved from his homophobic dad A gay teenager wrote a heartbreaking letter begging his neighbours to save him from his allegedly homophobic dad Brazilian media outlet G1 GO reported the 14-year-old lives in the city of Jataí, a municipality in the southern Goiás state of Brazil The teen pleaded with his neighbours to help him He wrote: “Have you ever felt you’re not good for anyone The teenager added that he “cannot take it anymore” and that he is in the “greatest despair of my life” neighbours also witnessed the father beat his son and sent a recording of the violent incident to the police The man was reportedly heard threatening to “kill” his son in the recording Didn’t I already tell you to change?” the father reportedly shouts at his son Police later attended the scene in Jataí, Brazil and confirmed the teen had abrasions on his body. Paula Daniela Ruza, a police spokesperson, said the father told police he “doesn’t care” that his son is gay, and said the incident happened because he caught his son “accessing pornographic videos on his cell phone” But the boy’s mother reportedly told police that she was aware of the father’s aggression towards their son which she said was because the teen “has a tendency to homosexuality” A neighbour told G1 that she always heard the teen “screaming” and “asking for help” She admitted: “It is difficult for people who are mothers to see a situation like this.” the teen was taken to an aunt’s house and will undergo counselling An investigation was launched into the incident and the police will be gathering information from neighbours and analysing the letter In 2019, the Supreme Court of Brazil voted to criminalise LGBT+ discrimination, making homophobic and transphobic crimes legally equivalent to racism. However, discrimination and violence against Brazil’s LGBT+ communities are widespread About us Contact us Advertise Work for us Terms and conditions Privacy policy © 2025 Hyderabad Media House Limited/The Hans India. All rights reserved. Powered by hocalwire.com