Honey bees are incredibly important pollinators responsible for the abundance and diversity of our food. Unfortunately they are in trouble, they are being threatened by a parasitic mite called varroa destructor. The team Wageningen UR wants to help the bees fight this mite with BeeT. This is an engineered bacteria that releases toxin in a specified and regulated manner. The released toxin is not harmful to bees or humans. To do so, the bacteria will employ a network of regulation mechanisms to produce the toxin only when mites are present and when enough bacteria are present to effectively kill the mite.

Project description