Difference between revisions of "Team:Tec-Chihuahua/Entrepreneurship"

Our client is the beekeeper that focuses in the caregiving and massive production of hives, for the national and international sale of products such as honey and its derivatives. These are of high importance for the Mexican economy, not only for the export of honey products but also because of the link between pollinating bees and the agriculture of the country. However, this industry does not receive the attention it deserves, because there are many illnesses that attack them and very few companies that dedicate themselves to prevent or treat them, or even to the development of research about it and how these illnesses affect the world’s economy.

The methods currently used to treat infected hives are antibiotics not specialized in diseases and the hive burning. The method by antibiotics is very controversial since the residues of antibiotics can infiltrate in the final products marketed like honey and propolis. As a consequence, the use of antibiotics has been banned in several countries because of the long-term effects that this could have on the health of consumers.

The current universally accepted method is the destruction and burning of the hive, however, the process ends in multimillion-dollar losses to the beekeeping community.

The American Foulbrood is an illness caused by a pathogenic bacterium called Paenibacillus larvae, which can be found globally and infects the hives. A single colony of the hive with the infection unrestrained will suffer a significative loss of larvae. Without the new litter to replace the elder workers, the entire colony will be in danger and will probably die. However, some colonies are strong enough to recover from the loss. Besides, there are some colonies, like the colonies of South America or the Africanized bees that can resist the infection of the pathogen. This phenomenon has the characteristic that this colonies usually produce a bigger amount of propolis when compared to the honey bees of Europe.

The European Foulbrood is an illness caused by the pathogenic bacterium, Gram-positive, called Melissococcus plutonius that affects the bee larvae. The genetic resistance of some bee species to the illness allows them to overcome the infections without suffering severe damages. However, it must be mentioned that it generally has a better forecast than the American Foulbrood, in some zones, the European Foulbrood has an even more malignant manifestation, damaging severely even the strong colonies of bees.¹

EFB affects mainly the unsealed babies, which can kill the larvae generally when they are 4 to 5 days old. The infected larvae move around the breeding cell, and instead of the regular rolled position, the larvae die displaced in their cell, twisted around the walls or stretched out. The color of the larvae changes from white to yellow, then brown and finally, when they decompose, black. If a big portion of the larvae dies, the patron of raising seems irregular and sometimes sends an unpleasant or sour smell.²

Our product will be a liquid mixture of antimicrobial peptide extracts that will eradicate European foulbrood and American foulbrood, this treatment will be applied in bee bread with the intention that this food reaches infected larvae. As a company, we firmly believe that with this we will achieve the highest quality standards in the product and with this achieve high sales levels a year around the world.

This product is intended to be a treatment that will improve the immune system of bees to make them more resistant to American foulbrood and European foulbrood of infected hives. This will be achieved by placing our antimicrobial peptides in PLGA nanocapsules, forming a kind of powder solution that will be placed in the liquid food of the hives, usually composed of water with sugar. Showing our product in different editions of sizes, suitable for the client's convenience.