Difference between revisions of "Team:Tec-Chihuahua/Human Practices"

Signed by 150 government leaders at the 1992 Rio Earth Summit, the Convention on Biological Diversity is dedicated to promoting sustainable development, Mexico is one of the countries that signed this Convention. The Conference of the Parties is the governing body of the Convention and advances implementation of the Convention through the decisions that take place at its periodic meetings. The Fourteenth meeting of the Conference of the Parties (COP 14) will be held in Sharm El-Sheikh, Egypt, 17^th - 29^th November 2018.¹

"MOP" stands for "Meeting of the Parties" of the protocol. This year will be COP-14 and MOP-9 of the Cartagena Protocol. Later, will be the MOP-2 of The Nagoya Protocol on Access and Benefit-sharing and the MOP-1 of The Nagoya - Kuala Lumpur Supplementary Protocol on Liability and Redress.

Biotechnology is being promoted as a better way to grow crops and produce medicines, but it has raised concerns about potential side effects on human health and the environment, including risks to biological diversity. In some countries, genetically altered agricultural products have been sold without much debate, while in others, there have been vocal protests against their use, particularly when they are sold without being identified as genetically modified. In response to these concerns, during the past two decades, two Protocols have been adopted by the Parties to the CBD. In January 2000, the Parties approved the Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety. This Protocol seeks to ensure the safe handling, transport, and use of living modified organisms (LMOs) resulting from biotechnology. To that end, the Protocol establishes procedures that allow countries to make informed decisions before agreeing to the import of LMOs into their territories.

More recently, the Parties adopted the Nagoya Protocol. It reaffirms each nation’s sovereignty over its genetic resources and calls for the fair and equitable sharing of benefits arising out of the utilization of genetic materials. By ensuring benefit-sharing, the Protocol seeks to create incentives to conserve and sustainably use biodiversity. The Nagoya Protocol entered into force on October 14^th 2014.³

One of the issues discussed in the Nagoya Protocol is the genome of a particular species may now be sequenced within a provider country and that information may be transferred digitally to a company or research entity for downloading to a DNA synthesizer.² Another significant issue discussed in the COP is if synthetic biology is different enough from modern biotechnology that it must require a different protocol and a different risk assessment, the GMOs of modern biotechnology.

The Parties to the CBD considered regulation of synthetic biology during their 12th COP meeting in October 2014. There, they agreed to take a precautionary approach to the release of any LMOs resulting from synthetic biology under the Cartagena Protocol. At the same time, the Parties called for the formation of an Ad Hoc Technical Expert Group on Synthetic Biology (AHTEG) to evaluate, among other things, whether existing arrangements constituted a comprehensive regulatory framework for addressing potential impacts from synthetic biology technologies.³

Article 15 of the Cartagena Protocol establishes that to do genetic engineering to develop or liberate a GMO, a risk assessment must be done first. The AHTEG was created to develop a risk assessment guide which was created about 8 years ago. Members from different countries that assisted to the COPs were invited to participate in this group and a risk assessment guide was started within the Cartagena protocol.

Dr. María Mercedes Roca is a professor of Biotechnology, formerly at the Monterrey Institute of Technology and Higher Education, Guadalajara campus in Mexico. She was one of the founding members of the National Biotechnology and Biosafety Committee of Honduras (CNBB for its Spanish acronym) which reviews submission for risk assessment of GMOs and advice the Honduran Government.

We were able to contact with Dr. Mercedes Roca thanks to Saúl Fernando Pizarro, a schoolmate and friend of ours who has participated in iGEM as a team member (2015), team leader (2016), and Co-chair of the Latin American Committee (2016). Dr. Mercedes is part of a group of Latin Americans unsatisfied with the rigorous risk assessment guide the AHTEG developed. Aware that in Latin America a risk assessment is needed and by taking into account the principles of biosafety in a very responsible way, this group made a guide under international confinements of risk assessment that people can follow and that countries can address, the guide is named Genetically Modified Organisms Environmental Risk Assessment Guide.

The guide her team has developed is a guide they expect servers biotechnology students like us, making it able for them to start a business or sell a product. Dr. Mercedes invited us to collaborate with her team in this guide by helping in its translation to Spanish, making able for their work to reach Spanish speaking people. We are pleased we worked for hand in hand with Saúl Pizarro in this translation.

AHTEG United Nation's guide was introduced in the thirteenth meeting of the Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity last year in Mexico but wasn't approved by the Parties, this year Dr. Mercedes will present her team’s alternative guide at the Fourteenth meeting of the Conference of the Parties (COP 14) in Egypt. Acquiring this guide won't have any type cost; it is an effort of a group of academics that want to give to the regulators of the countries, developers, and students an environmental risk assessment they can rely on.

Dr. Mercedes invited us to join Saúl Pizarro and her at the COP 14 as members of Youth Biotech, an international group of young leaders who are interested in the development of science communication, policy making, and biotechnology regulation. It was born on December 2016 after a group of biotech students attended the UN Biodiversity Conferences as a part of the Public Research and Regulation Initiative (PRRI).

Dr. Mercedes recommended us to base our Integrated Human Practices in the United Nations’ three dimensions for a sustainable development: Economic, Environmental and Social. On the social aspect, she recommended us to include our projects’ ethical and legal aspects. Formerly, we were planning on managing 4 dimensions, ethical, legal, social and economic.

She suggested us to talk about a complex; there is not a complete understanding nor a single reason why bees are disappearing, it might be due to various diseases, malnutrition, insecticides, is a complex of reasons. Our project won't solve the problem, but it will contribute to managing the Colony Collapse Disorder. She said is very common to tend to talk about human rights, but these are not the only rights that have to be worth, the environment should have his rights just for its intrinsic value.

MEXMUN is a student simulation of the debates that take place in the main deliberative bodies of the United Nations Organization, discussing economic, political and social issues. In this simulation, students take on the role of representatives of different countries before the UN, knowing and maintaining their national interests, having to reach the end of a resolution.

As part of our Education and Public Engagement activities, we developed MEXMUN edition 2018 topic “Synthetic biology as a tool for the development of biological weapons" in the First Committee on Disarmament and International Security (CDSI in Spanish) to be discussed by high school students from different states of the republic at the UN simulation. We intended to get more students interested and involved on synthetic biology issues as well as evaluate the possible risks of employing the tools this new discipline requires, tools we use in the laboratory for the construction of our product.

To make sure we had developed a wholesome and reflexive topic which students can build upon, we had to look over the international mechanisms, agreements and bodies that regulate, look after and assure the responsible and safe use of synthetic biology and GMOs.

We investigated on the Geneva Protocol, Rio de Janeiro Earth Summit, Cartagena Protocol, Convention on Biological Diversity, Biosafety-Clearance house, the Nagoya - Kuala Lumpur Supplementary Protocol and Nagoya Protocol. Through this research, we learned on biosafety matters regarding synthetic biology and we raised self-awareness on the globalization of this discipline and how it becomes more accessible every day to acquire and implement its tools and methods, for example, for biohackers. We understood the importance of biodiversity, bioethics, regulations, and dialogue as well as we raised awareness of the scopes of synthetic biology understanding the importance and the need to adhere not only to its local and national guidelines but also to the international.

Trough this research we evaluated the possible risks of releasing GMOs into the environment like for example, the risk of genetic information transferring from one GMO to a non-GMO. We acquire knowledge of an international framework directly related to our project and necessary to fully understand the importance of the next activity described in this United Nations section.

After receiving feedback from beekeepers, we looked into bees’ anatomy and behavior in a healthy environment. We were looking to enrich our investigation with the point of view of a veterinary expert. Dr. Tanus provided us with an hour and a half of his time to listen to our work. He began by introducing the arrival of foulbrood in Mexico and mentioning the National Program for Honey Harmlessness and Quality, which appeals to European standards (since the EU is Mexican honey’s largest purchaser). Among these standards, Mexico asks honey producers to create antibiotic-free products.

On our own account, we found NOM--SEMARNAT/SAGARPA-2007 which sets parameters under which it is legal to start fires on forestry, agricultural, and cattle land. It allows fires for the control of bacterial diseases, after meeting several requirements.

He mentioned foulbrood incidence has declined since 2008 thanks to the Good Honey Production Practices manual which recommends changing boxes and preventive strategies for beekeepers. He mentioned MSc Juan Diego Perez de la Rosa, Head of the Department of Genomic Sequencing at the National Center for Animal Health Verification Services, who has cultured Paenibacillus larvae for identification, from samples taken in 17 different states of the Mexican Republic.

Tanus stated that it is impossible to say that there is no presence of foulbrood in Mexico without first conducting an epizootiology study in the country. He clarified that the word of a beekeeper is not in doubt; however, it might be hard to obtain real data as it is a mandatory complaint issue, so there is distrust of the producer. He shared some characteristics that differentiate both foulbrood. He also commented on the incidence of these diseases throughout the seasons.

Dr. Tanus suggested liquid application (in the form of syrup) which beekeepers could feed their hives. This syrup (sweetened water) could contain the peptides in it and be fed directly to the box. This way, nurse bees would feed on here. Since Africanized bees appeared, he claims, it is better to have interior feeding to avoid foragers. This method would also avoid product loss from environmental conditions such as the wind or sun.

He reassured us that peptides would get to the brood, regardless of the application and only the time it takes might change. Peptides cannot arrive directly since larvae do not feed on their own: on their first 3 days, larvae are fed jelly, and with bee bread the following three. He also gave us a first draft of the path the peptides follow: from the digestive system to the hemolymph and finally to the hypopharyngeal glands in the head where they produce royal jelly.

Adult bees are not affected by P. larvae. In fact, in their digestive system, there is an anatomical structure called proventriculus and can close when the time comes to purify the food. He shared with us a new fact about hygienic behavior. As brood infected with AFB begin metamorphosis, proteolytic enzymes from P. larvae degrade fibers and reduce them to pure viscose biomass. Bees organs in their antennas can sense this decomposition; cleaner bees then break through the capped cell, remove the corpse, and clean the cell. All colonies of beehives exhibit this behavior being in some more marked than in others.

He congratulated us for our work; he found our efforts and interest fascinating, especially when we put it to work to help the beekeeper community up close. He encouraged us to keep at it and invited us to the XXVI International Congress for Beekeeping Updates in 2019.

The chat was enlightening, and gave us valuable information for our research, hard to find in books or articles. He also recommended a website to check for information (OIE) which had epidemiological information on both foulbroods. We are still awaiting the 2018 update of foulbrood presence across the world.

We greatly thank Ernesto Tanus for his time and disposition, especially by giving us faith and encouragement to keep going and make this a reality.

The main objective of the realization of this visit was to get to know and evaluate the ideal conditions with which M. plutonius and P. larvae grow and how are they handled in vitro. On another hand, we looked forward to knowing the practices of in vitro bee breeding.

Four members of the team had the opportunity to travel to Cuauhtémoc and attend this visit where we invested approximately four hours, first in the laboratory and then in the field. M.S. Alejandro Romo Chacón (who has participated in more than 20 scientific dissemination articles related to bees or agriculture) welcomed us to the facilities and once we entered the laboratory he began to explain us about the bees’ life cycle and about some of the products and instruments beekeepers use to handle hives. Later, we were able to meet M.S. Adrián Ponce de León, who is researching about foulbrood bacteria, and along with M.S. Romo, he explained us about procedures and safety considerations in order to manage the in vitro growth of P. larvae and M. plutonius.

Interacting with the bees and being able to observe the composition of the bee boxes, the way in which the different foods were applied and the way in which beekeepers approached the bees were all key elements that allowed us to define the optimum application method of our product and helped us ensure its appropriate integration regarding each characteristic of the hive organization and the work done by beekeepers.

Thanks to this visit we were able to have our first real approach with bees, we knew the reality of working with them and working with the two strains according to a specialized laboratory that has already experienced the proper biosafety considerations. This visit gave us different data that is very useful for the whole experimental plan of our project, and besides that, we lived a little of what beekeepers live every day, like traveling inside the truck with many bees that stayed inside from the field and even experiencing some bee-stings. We were also able to capture amazing photos of the hives!

P.hD. David de Jong is a professor of genetics and entomology at the University of São Paulo, Ribeirão Preto School of Medicine (specialist in pathology, biology, and management of Africanised honey bees); he is also technical Editor of an online scientific journal: Genetics and Molecular Research (GMR).

Our team leader, human practices leader, and our ethics, legal and mathematical model representatives were present in this 40-minute call to approach issues regarding their respective divisions. David the Jong is a researcher that has written in many papers we had previously found and read on bees; we thank MVZ Ernesto Tanús for contacting us with him. First off, he was curious if we were planning to test our peptides on the bee larvae or in the colony, so far, the idea was to test them against a bacterium within a culture in the lab, we were working on the time to see if we could test them in vivo on the larvae but we were not quite sure yet. He said that was a good first step and recommend us to emphasize that on our plan.

Regarding the application method of our product, we were considering putting nanocapsules containing our AMPs within the bee’s liquid food substitute. He said it’s feasible, but we would want to make sure bees could digest them. An excellent measure he suggested us was to eventually plan to extract the hypopharyngeal glands in bees and determine if our AMPs are entering these glands.

He believes okay for us to supply our peptides and then try to see if they help bees resist foulbrood, as for now, he thinks it's an excellent first step if we can produce some material and prove it to work on the laboratory, he mentioned that's a paper already. He emphasized is not easy to have real larvae on the laboratory.

We were wondering his opinion whether our AMPs could affect the larvae negatively in their development or worker bees in general. He compared or product to a human antibiotic, it kills the disease, but it also eliminates part of its microbiota, he thinks we could mention it, but we would have to test these possibilities experimentally and see what happens. He stated antibiotic treatments available now for foulbrood not always work, and they could contaminate the honey. Regarding the possibility of our AMPs getting into the honey, he thinks there are going to be low levels of our peptides, and they are going to be on the larvae, he doesn't think it's going to be a problem our AMPs getting to the honey.

If we want to see if our AMPs are getting into the food nurse bees are feeding the larvae in the colony, we would have to use a colony or a mini colony, which is more complicated, he said.

"Many people have been working on ways to protect the bees, they have different systems they are using, but none of these experiments involve all these different steps you are needing because it's very ambitious and requires much time". He thinks if we can get the peptides off our bacterium and then show that they inhibit P. larvae and M. plutonius, we can talk about the next steps on a plan.

We were wondering if our peptides could activate some biochemical signal or have the larvae reject them. He said if an animal is given something it produces, the tendency is this animal will produce less. He recommended us to see if naturally, bee AMPs get into their food, it could be that maybe if bees have available more AMPs, they disactivate the bacteria, he wasn't sure about it.

When nanoencapsulated medicine is done, there is the risk that it can get accumulated somewhere within the organism since honey bees live within a month, he doesn't deem that is something we should worry about, yet he would say the fat body, that's the place bees tend to accumulate.

Regarding the incidence of American or European foulbrood, he mentioned he has worked in the US for control of these two diseases, the percentage was always around one percent, sometimes two. In Brazil, it's not established, they have few European foulbrood cases and there is no presence of American foulbrood, by the other hand, in Argentina, it has been a big problem. He was there to diagnose the first official finding of it, they had many thousands of colines dying, since then, some of their people went to Brazil to learn bee genetics and the incidence was very much reduced.

In Mexico, we have the presence of Varroa, he mentioned that's a concern because is probably affecting the bee's immune system, another reason to be concerned about the AMPs levels. If we get to see if nurse bee AMPs get to the food of larvae, that is an interesting result because it helps researches understand how bees can resist diseases. Beyond the work, we are proposing, or as part of it, he thinks is interesting to have that information.

As we continue talking about foulbrood, we asked him if it's legal to burn beehives on Brazil, he answered it’s not for someone who is not a beekeeper, the fireman is only supposed to do it if it’s a matter of environmental protection. He has burned a few beehives in a demonstration of how they control the disease when it is found, normally the government would burn beehives is there's a new problem or disease, but they are supposed to pay the beekeeper. He told us about when he was a US bee inspector, what they would do is when they find the disease, they would burn the colonies, quarantine the apiary, and tell the beekeeper he had five days to challenge, after that period, colonies that had symptoms would be burned.

What he would do is he would burn the frames and the columns on the bees and then crush the boxes so the beekeeper couldn't put bees in it anymore, nowadays, gasoline is used. The reason he did that is he wanted to make sure all the honey was destroyed because the honey stores were contaminated with the spores of American foulbrood and if the honey wasn't destroyed, all the apiaries around would get infected. Another way the disease is spread between beekeepers is through the places where honey is processed, they bring honey from different beekeepers or different countries and process it, if it is contaminated and bees get access to it, the disease is spread in the surroundings. Another way of spreading is when a beekeeper wants to buy or sell beehives or equipment that is contaminated because they don't see the symptoms and the person who is selling or buying, doesn't know there is a contamination.

We were curious if there were any biotechnical regulations that apply to bees in Brazil and the US regarding experimental work on them for example, for eradicating diseases. In Brazil they have no regulation affecting research with honey bees, the only regulation is involving bees in the wild. For experimental work, for instance, he is on the ethics committee of the hospital, he mentioned for human research a permission is needed as for animal research, but there are no insects’ permissions.

He offered to contact us to speak with Erica Weinstein Teixeira, she was a student of him, she set up a laboratory and it’s a good bee pathologist. Erika has worked with viruses and diagnosis and said she probably knows about AMPs. He also offered to contact us with more researchers in his lab in case we needed to.

Ultimately, he mentioned American foulbrood was not a problem in Brazil, but in Argentina is. He sent us some papers that could be useful to our research and said it was a good project. We are thankful for his help and for his willingness to keep supporting us.

Dr. Ernesto Guzmán is a professor and head of the Honey Bee Research Centre at the University of Guelph; he received a DVM degree from the National Autonomous University of Mexico and a MSc and Ph.D. in entomology from the University of California, Davis. Dr. Guzmán has advised or co-advised the theses of more than 50 DVM, MSc, and Ph.D. students. Research in his lab focuses on three main areas: genetics, behavior and parasitic mites of honey bees, identifying factors that affect honey bee health.

Finally, we were curious whether there were any regulations regarding experimentation on bees in his country, to which he answered there are none in Canada concerning experimentation on them, yet, he doesn't consider there should be since regulating it would hinder and inhibit research with them. Ultimately, he wished us luck and referred to our project as good and novel.

We thank Mr. Guillermo Rodríguez for inviting us to the monthly meeting of the Cuauhtemoc's beekeeping society where we had our first approach with the beekeeping community. The society consisted of approximately 33 beekeepers and researchers who gave us a warm welcome, listened to our project, and gave us their opinion on particular details that we had to consider or improve. They were happy that young students of other disciplines were interested in their work and bees, we explained to them the reason it was important for us to talk with them and why we had chosen to work with bees in our project, something that made them curious.

Until that meeting, our project consisted of the production of antimicrobial peptides in Pichia pastorisfor exclusively the inhibition of the pathogen Paenibacillus larvae. We planned on using yeasts due to their high capacity to carry out post-translational modifications, similar to the protein folding mechanisms of bees and their ability to secrete heterologous proteins to the environment, in this case, our antimicrobial peptides. The intention was to apply these yeasts in a solution with hexane extract of the plant Achyrocline satureioides which its efficiency against P. larvae has already been shown previouslysup>2, in presence also of surfactins, the surfactin would have a synergistic effect with the hexane extract. Previous studies on B. subtilis have shown that surfactin, a lipopeptide produced by the bacteria, inhibits the pathogens of honey bees, including P. larvae, A. apis and Nosema ceranae.¹ This solution would be applied to bee bread, which we knew, the larvae ingested in their diet.

Through their feedback, we evaluated the risks of using yeasts in our product and the risks of introducing GMOs in what is known as "harmless honey". They emphasized that an overdose of yeasts would cause a fermentation of the honey and an alteration in the microbiota of the bees which could be counterproductive since this would cause diseases such as American foulbrood to arrive, they recommended us to be very careful with the dose and consider the addition of a fermentation inhibitor in our formula. From this meeting, we set out to investigate the export requirements of honey, which is the main product exported by beekeepers, and how our genetically modified yeasts would affect or play a role in these requirements.

One issue we were asked to review was whether the hexane extract of A.satureioides oxidized because if so, it loses its qualities. Currently, a treatment that they use to fight diseases in bees is the oregano essential oil which they have already found to be oxidized. After further investigation, we verified that certainly, the extract that we wanted to add is oxidized by exposure to air. Another treatment that beekeepers use to fight diseases, is the sodium bicarbonate which, when it is spread in the hive, causes the bees to begin a cleaning protocol with which they take that bicarbonate out of their hive taking away the dirt present.

Thanks to this meeting, we set out to investigate the export requirements of honey, which is the main product exported by beekeepers, and how our genetically modified yeasts would affect or play a role in these requirements. They mentioned that they do not usually have much time to try different combinations of treatments and find out the optimal combination. They said there is not much research in the beekeeping sector, so it seems excellent that we intend to carry out scientific research in this field and try different combinations of peptides thus ensuring the best combination.

They also told us about other bee pathogens, Nosema apis and Varroa destructor. They commented that, if effective, our product is excellent, however, they also mentioned that in general there are many good products and at a reasonable price, however, they are challenging to work with, occasional applications are less complicated than regular ones. They look for a practical alternative, cheap and that doesn't consume time. Concerning the final product being a dilution, they commented that this was difficult to apply since, if our product was to be applied frequently, it would be laborious to have to spray every three days, for example, 2,000 boxes of bees.

Subsequently, they mentioned that, in their city, the foulbrood that represents a problem is the European, which occurs when bees have little accessibility to pollen because of the little flowering throughout the year. Previously we had read about this disease; however, it was from this meeting that we investigated more about it and after validating the theoretical efficacy of our antimicrobial peptides of interest against this disease, we decided to address it as part of the pathogens to combat with our product.

Finally, they congratulated us for our research and stressed the importance of feedback between researcher and producer since in this way we can collaborate in a more effective way, guaranteeing a bidirectional communication. They invited us to continue attending their and MSc Alejandro Romo, a researcher at the Center for Food Research and Development (For its acronym in Spanish: CIAD), offered to do the experimentation with bees from our research in his laboratory in Cuauhtémoc, the same laboratory that we visited one month later.

After this meeting, our project changed to production of antimicrobial peptides in Escherichia coli for the inhibition of Paenibacillus larvae and Melissococcus plutonius

Looking forward to expanding our international reach, we encountered the possibility to contact the Italian Federation of Beekeepers (FAI). Successfully, after exchanging some emails we were able to schedule a virtual meeting with the FAI presidential staff member Lorenzo Della Morte. We were very excited to have the opportunity to share and also nurture our project with insights, concerns and regulations that came from the city that hosts the headquarters of many important multinational food companies and agencies, such as the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) and The World Food Programme (WFP). Eight members of the team could attend this important reunion that lasted approximately 40 minutes.

Foulbrood incidence rate in Italy usually has a seasonal trend with the largest number of registered infections during the second semester of the year (July-December). Regarding the impact and incidence of these two diseases on Italian beekeeping, FAI Italian Federation of Beekeepers has consulted the National Centre of Reference on bee diseases, who elaborated an official data reporting 51 complaints of colony infections from 7 on the 20 Italian Regions, for the year 2017. The number of infected and then destroyed colonies is a few tens of units compared to the 1.300.000 colonies, which constitute the Italian beekeeping heritage.

From the FAI point of view, the data is not to be considered statistically reliable both for the low number of registered cases and for the missing complaints. In fact, in order to avoid the Veterinarian Police controls, many beekeepers often don’t report the infection and directly destroy the colonies in secret. According to FAI estimates the incidence rate of foulbrood can’t be lower than the 10-20% of the Italian beekeeping heritage in total.

The apiary will be seized for at least 9 days and until the positive outcome of the treatment, in order to assess the efficacy of the “swarming technique”. Anyway, also, in this case, the beekeeper can ask the destruction of all the affected colonies to the veterinarian authority.

In both the cases AFB and EFB, the use of antibiotics is not allowed in Italy because of its ineffectiveness and to prevent the spread of antibiotic-resistant bacterial strains.

FAI emphasized a very important point that seems not only to apply in Italy but throughout the whole world: there are no different solutions to AFB and EFB diseases these days and the legislative tools are often perceived as repressive, so many beekeepers don’t notify the infection in their apiary, destroying the infected colonies and concealing the fact. This is one of the most relevant problems for the health and statistical assessment studies.

After Mr. Della Morte learned about our project and the scopes of synthetic biology regarding beekeeping, he considered our proposal as a possibility of prevention method against the diseases. Our product would help beekeepers do not have to lose all their beehives and save money.

After the video call, Mr. Raffaele Cirone and his staff reflected on our project information and kindly sent us their final insights:

The Italian Federation of Beekeepers believes that AMPABEE Project is a new and innovative approach to such incurable diseases as AFB and EFB. Preventing the spread of these bacteria and increasing the immune system of bee larvae is an important goal to achieve in the health bee risk prevent. In particular, nowadays the only preventing tools are the Beekeeping Best Practices (BBP) which depends on the personal application beekeepers carry out. In this respect, FAI considers essential to test this research on the pure Italian Apis mellifera ligustica, as it is the most widespread in the world. In this regard, FAI will collaborate and provide the necessary support, remaining at iGEM team Tec-Chihuahua disposal in case of need for further information for the research project and programme. FAI is totally sure that such a research could find a spreading interest in the beekeeping world at different scales. FAI can support the product commercialization thanks to the FAI’s Service Company and the FAI trade partnerships covering the entire national territory.

We are truly grateful with Ernesto Tanús Sánchez, Manuel Ramírez Salcido, Juan Diego Pérez de la Rosa and Felipe Esquivel Díaz president of the Delicia’s beekeepers society in behalf of such, for inviting us as speakers at the IV State Beekeeping Forum, a forum organized by the Delicia’s Beekeepers society in coordination with the city council and the state government. The experience itself in addition to the willingness and kindness of beekeepers, government representatives, and beekeeping companies to contribute to our project, made of this event a valuable approach to understanding how the world affects our project and how our project affects the world.

The forum was held in the Chihuahuan Desert Museum and had an approximate of 340 attendees from the state including beekeepers from the Cuauhtemoc’s beekeeping society, attendees from other states and from the country of Chile. The event intended to update the sector, discuss existing options for increasing productivity and encourage beekeepers to continue making products derived from honey.

It was important for us to get involved with our relevant communities seeking stimulating dialogues and bi-directional learning. We engaged conversation with Engineer Sóstenes Rafael Rodríguez Dehaibes, CEO of COMVERMIEL and national and international speaker in beekeeping pathology topics in Mexico, Brazil, Uruguay, Argentina, Venezuela, and Colombia. Mr. Sóstenes shared with us some of the studies made for honey exportation and stressed the importance of surveillance plans for this product, which means it must be defined which parameters should be analyzed and at which intervals. This way, there is a minimization of risks, and the cost-benefit is optimized.

During this forum, we talked with many beekeepers, between the topics we were discussing they mentioned all wild pollinators are scarce. They told us in Germany when researchers went to the field looking for bumblebees, they did not find any, they realized that their cars had no insects that had hit their windows on the road, there is a degree of desertification of insects.

A research done in 2017 has documented a dramatic decline in average airborne insect biomass of 76% (up to 82% in midsummer) in just 27 years for protected nature areas in Germany. This considerably exceeds the estimated decline of 58% in global abundance of wild vertebrates over a 42-year period to 2012. Their results demonstrate that recently reported declines in several taxa such as butterflies, wild bees and moths, are in parallel with a severe loss of total aerial insect biomass, suggesting that it is not only the vulnerable species but the flying insect community as a whole, that has been decimated over the last few decades.²

In the forum, we had the opportunity to speak with diverse beekeeping companies, Api ofertas, APIMAT, X-nox Inovación and Salcido apiarios, who showed us some of their beekeeping products and also treatments they market for managing Varroa. We participated in a raffle organized by Api Ofertas and we are so excited we won a Beekeeper suit we will show it to our iGEM friends in Boston!

On the first day of the forum, the Delicia’s beekeeping association invited us to join them in a dinner, at this dinner we spoke with Mr. Rodolfo Contreras Martínez and Mr. Rodolfo Contreras Lozano, two beekeepers from Chile owners of San Martín Apiaries. We spoke about pollination, the

We were the closure presentation of the event. Juan Carlos Coronado, a Chilean beekeeper we met at the forum, invited us to visit his apiaries. In general, beekeepers told us we were doing impressive research and saw huge potential in our work as a real solution for the foulbrood problem as well as a possible treatment for Nosema and Varroa. Other presentations at the forum included topics such as pollination, neonicotinoids in Beekeeping, the honey market, between others.

On the last day of the event, we visited apiaries with visitors from Mexico city, Chile, Cuauhtemoc city and other states of the republic. We went to visit two apiaries, one of them was exclusively for breeding queen bees and the other one was for honey production. We were taught how to differentiate between the different types of bees, for example between drone bees, queen bees, and worker bees. We saw larvae in their cells and visualized a worm that parasites bees. It was an incredible experience for us.

Trough the three days, we applied surveys to beekeepers to obtain more information on foulbrood in the country. Beekeepers from a variety of ages and states answered these surveys. We had a total of 16 answered surveys. We confirmed there had been the presence of American and European foulbrood in Mexico in the last seven years with an increase in the previous 3 years. Terramycin is the most used treatment to combat this diseases. When we asked how much would they be willing to invest for a product that combats and prevents this both diseases and in general strengthens the immune system of bees, 50% of the surveyed said they would pay the necessary.