1. Joint toxic effects of thiamethoxam and flusilazole on the adult worker honey bees (Apis mellifera L.).
- Author
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Wang D, Lv L, Gao Z, Zhu YC, Weng H, Yang G, and Wang Y
- Subjects
- Bees, Animals, Thiamethoxam toxicity, Triazoles toxicity, Neonicotinoids toxicity, Insecticides toxicity, Pesticides toxicity
- Abstract
Insect pollinators are routinely exposed to a complex mixture of many pesticides. However, traditional environmental risk assessment is only carried out based on ecotoxicological data of single substances. In this context, we aimed to explore the potential effects when worker honey bees (Apis mellifera L.) were simultaneously challenged by thiamethoxam (TMX) and flusilazole (FSZ). Results displayed that TMX possessed higher toxicity to A. mellifera (96-h LC
50 value of 0.11 mg a. i. L-1 ) than FSZ (96-h LC50 value of 738 mg a. i. L-1 ). Furthermore, the mixture of TMX and FSZ exhibited an acute synergistic impact on the pollinators. Meanwhile, the activities of SOD, caspase 3, caspase 9, and PPO, as well as the expressions of six genes (abaecin, dorsal-2, defensin-2, vtg, caspase-1, and CYP6AS14) associated with oxidative stress, immune response, lifespan, cell apoptosis, and detoxification metabolism were noteworthily varied in the individual and mixture challenges than at the baseline level. These data revealed that it is imminently essential to investigate the combined toxicity of pesticides since the toxicity evaluation from individual compounds toward honey bees may underestimate the toxicity in realistic conditions. Overall, the present results could help understand the potential contribution of pesticide mixtures to the decline of bee populations., Competing Interests: Declaration of competing interest The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper., (Copyright © 2022 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.)- Published
- 2023
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