Building Better Bee Nutrition and RNAi Tools with Vincent Ricigliano, PhD (392)

Building Better Bee Nutrition and RNAi Tools with with Vincent Ricigliano, PhD  (392)

Jerry Gadowskis

Yes, I'm Jerry Gadowskis. I'm from McHenry, Illinois, and uh I'm a beekeeper uh not only in Illinois but also tied in with Florida Welcome to the Beekeeping Today Podcast.

Jeff Ott

Welcome to Beekeeping Today Podcast presented by Betterbee, your source for beekeeping news, information, and entertainment. I'm Jeff Ott.

Becky Masterman

And I'm Becky Masterman.

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Jeff Ott

Hey, a quick shout out to BetterBee and all of our sponsors whose support allows us to bring you this podcast each week without resorting to a fee-based subscription. We don't want that and we know you don't either. Be sure to check out all of our content on the website. There, you can read up on all of our guests, read our blog on the various aspects and observations about beekeeping, search for, download, and listen to over 300 past episodes, read episodes translated. Transcripts, leave comments and feedback on each episode, and check on podcast specials from our sponsors. You can find it all at www. beekeepingtoday. com. Thank you, Jerry, for that wonderful opening. From Illinois.

We recorded Cherry at the North American Honey Bee Expo way back in January. That was fun. And I'm looking forward to twenty twenty-seven.

Becky Masterman

Absolutely. It it would be nice to be back and I I think I need to bring a trailer. Start planning my purchases now.

Jeff Ott

Reserve your truck spot in the back of the expo hall.

Becky Masterman

I don't know how to drive a truck and trailer, but you know, there's a first time for everything, especially in January.

Jeff Ott

Yeah, you got a few months to learn. Well, we have some fun news about North American Honey Bee Expo. If you've listened to the podcast You may have heard our short a couple weeks ago with Kamen Reynolds. In that we kind of hid a little bit of information that Becky and I are working on. with Cayman.

Becky Masterman

Also, it's good timing, right? Because we've got a lot coming up in January of twenty twenty seven because We each spent a whole year of our our lives in twenty twenty five five. Unless I need to write this down. We wrote a book, a a begetti beekeeping book, Beekeeping Today And that will be released in January of 2027. But we also were invited to do a beekeeping short course, a beginning beekeeping short course at the North American Honey Bee Expo and and organize that. So I mean what a great, great expo it's going to be for us.

Jeff Ott

Yeah, we're not gonna be resting next January, that's for sure.

Becky Masterman

Well and I think There goes our December too, because we want to make sure that Wait what? Yeah, yeah. And November. It's such an exciting opportunity to teach beekeeping at an expo where you've got the resources that are going to be a room away or within the room or the experts are going to be there too. I mean, I am so excited to think about what we're going to figure out in the next six months? Yeah. Wait, how many seven months?

Jeff Ott

Maybe six six months. Six or seven months.

Becky Masterman

I can't wait because we already have a great, great outline for it. And it's going to be a great um beginning beekeeping adventure, I think, for a lot of people. So

Jeff Ott

And just to pick up on what you're saying, it's the fun thing is going to be that when we talk about a piece of equipment or we talk about a personality or talk about a technique. that person more than likely or that technology or that equipment is gonna be around the corner in the expo hall. And the beekeepers will be able to go over and take what we've taught them and what we've demonstrated and go see it for themselves and learn.

Becky Masterman

I'm thinking, Jeff, beekeeping short course slash scavenger hunt?

Jeff Ott

Oh yeah That's right. You find it, you keep it. No, or no, no, no.

Becky Masterman

They don't get to keep it they can buy it. But but even just just the opportunities at the honey show to be able to taste honey be Because, you know, a lot of beekeeping is about honey production and and it's not just one flavor, right? So there there's just so much that they can learn by hands-on or listening to different experts, it's going to be just really a a great opportunity for newer beekeepers.

Jeff Ott

I'm looking forward to the expo. And and Becky, I just wanna say that our book is now available for pre-order and we'll provide the link. in the show notes if someone is so inclined.

Becky Masterman

That is so exciting. I think I might pre-order one just because

Jeff Ott

That's a good idea. That's a good idea. Becky, I'm looking forward to our guest today, Dr. Vincent Rasigliano, who is a USDA ARS researcher.

Becky Masterman

He's got a lot to tell us and uh I love it when smart people are doing good things for bees.

Jeff Ott

He came to our attention for his work on blue green algae and I think that anyone who can tell us about the benefits of blue green algae is worth having on the show, so I'm looking forward to Vincent coming on. Right after these words from our sponsors.

Betterbee

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Jeff Ott

Welcome back everybody. Sitting around this great big Beekeeping Today podcast table, we have Dr. Vincent Rosigliano sitting down in Davis, California. Becky in Minnesota. And I'm sitting here in Olympia.

Dr. Vincent Ricigliano

Vincent, welcome to the show. Yeah, thanks a lot for having me.

Becky Masterman

We are thrilled that you were able to join us. You came highly recommended, so We can't wait to have this discussion.

Jeff Ott

You came to our attention for your research in nutrition, and honey bee nutrition is getting a lot of press these days in the last several years and and its importance When I started beekeeping it was just like pollen is about it. And that's all we knew about the nutritional needs of honey bees. But in the recent history, there's been a lot more discovered. So we're looking forward to talking to you Can you tell us a little bit about yourself, your background with bees and and then we'll get into uh the subject a little deeper

Dr. Vincent Ricigliano

Yeah, sure. So well again, thanks thanks for having me. I'm a USDA ARS research scientist at the Pollinator Health Lab in Davis, California. I've been doing ARSB research for about 11 years now and recently relocated my lab to California from the ARSB lab in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Prior to bee research, my training was in plant and microbial biotechnology, and I was involved in a couple of projects dealing with flower symmetry and the genes underlying flower symmetry. Of course, flower symmetry determines which pollinators visit these flowers. And so I was somewhat interested in pollinator, plant pollinator interactions.

That's probably where, you know, some of my interest in nutrition came from. I saw a job for honey bee microbiome research. as I was about to graduate grad school and I just thought it sounded so fascinating. There's something about it that I was like, you know, I I really want this job. And uh I thought it was kind of a long shot. I I had never even seen a bee colony before and I thought it was a long shot, but I applied and uh spoke to my old boss and I just said, look, I don't have experience with bees, but I want to learn I have this other experience that I think could translate really well to bee research.

I got the job and started honey bee research, kinda fell in love with honey bee research. Bees is an agricultural system that, you know, interfaces with these other agricultural systems and something so important to our food security uh and just agriculture in general. And the rest is kind of history. How did you learn about beekeeping? My postdoc was at the ARSB lab in Tucson, Arizona. And I learned from the staff there, from Mel Boss, Kirk Anderson. A lot of the technicians at that bee Lob were really great, Milango Weiss, Brendan Mott. So yeah, learned learned quite a bit from the staff there.

Jeff Ott

When we talk about your research, everyone talks of the blue-green algae research that you've done. But I know you've done a lot more, but you know, that's kind of like the no one thinks about Algae and honey bees. And so let's explore then. Why algae?

Dr. Vincent Ricigliano

First, I'd like to say, you know, I'm not just uh an algae guy, right? My my work right now. My work focuses mainly actually on mites and viruses and nutrition kind of tertiary just because mites and viruses are kind of a major issue right now. And in general though, I would say my lab does work to build better feeds. But also and most importantly, right now, better tools to help colonies and beekeepers deal with kind of some of the biggest stressors facing honey bees right now. Nutrition is an important one though. Oh yeah, I'd like to say also we have a a new paper that just got published yesterday dealing with RNAI and mites.

So maybe I could send you that link and You could link it in the in the show notes.

Becky Masterman

We have so much to talk about. Sorry to interrupt you, but let's make sure we're pay making notes.

Jeff Ott

So we'll spend the first five minutes on the blue-green algae and then we'll spend the rest of the algae already.

Becky Masterman

Vincent is not gonna let us go on unless you go to the blue-green algae.

Dr. Vincent Ricigliano

Okay, yeah, well no, I I am excited to talk about the work with algae. It is an interesting one and definitely like catches people's attention because it's so strange, you know, like algae with bees and yeah, so uh of course like just First and foremost, you know, nutrition is very important, of course, right? And one of the simplest ways to think about beet nutrition is that they need more than just calories, of course, but they need a balanced diet.

You know, honey and nectar provide these carbohydrates, which fuel the colony energetically, but pollen is where bees get most of their proteins, amino acids, lipids, vitamins, minerals, antioxidants, and a lot of other compounds tied to immunity and development Of course, again, you know, one of the most important things about bee nutrition is that the colony operates or nutrition operates at multiple levels in the colony simultaneously. So the superorganism concept of colony nutrition or superorganism concept of the honey bee colony really shines in the context of nutrition. You know, you have the colony level.

the adult worker level, the larval level, and this colony is really a nutritional network. So what the colony stores and consumes affects the nurse fees. And that affects what the nurse bees can, of course, produce to feed larvae. And the quality of those larvae determine the next generation of workers and natural systems. Natural ecosystems, bees will consume or and collect pollen from many different sources, but uh modern agricultural landscapes are often dominated by large monocultures and So even when colonies experience periods where they have abundant forage, it might not be nutritionally balanced or complete.

As we know, beekeepers will feed pollen substitute diets, especially during periods of forage scarcity or before pollination contracts And the goal is to usually maintain brood production and keep up colony growth. But there's a lot of limitations when it comes to these pollen substitute diets. Right, current pollen substitutes can absolutely be useful tools, but many of them were kind of originally designed mostly around their protein content, usually some kind of cheap agricultural byproducts, and you know, we're increasingly understanding that pollen is much more than it's much more complex than just protein or even just crude lipids, but like I said, a particular amino acid balance.

Certain lipids, sterols, micronutrients, antioxidants, and especially fibers that interact with the gut microbiome, which I think is an area that needs more research focus. So the challenge then, especially to modern beekeeping, becomes how do we make supplemental diets that function more like real pollen? One of the things that kind of led me down this road of uh researching the impact of microalgae or blue green algae on bees was these algae are actually or certain microalgae, especially things like spirulina or chlorella, are are very rich and highly bioavailable protein, essential amino acids, lipids, vitamins.

So a lot of these things have nutritional profiles that are surprisingly similar to pollen. And uh the idea isn't that algae might magically replace pollen, but the idea is that algae might help us build better supplemental feeds that are closer to pollen than certain ingredients. It might even have certain functional properties that could stimulate the bees' immune system and make them more resilient to particular stressors Another important thing is the sustainability of algae as a nutrition source, right?

It could be grown really efficiently on non-arrable land, relatively low water use, and without competing directly with human food consumption So from a long-term agricultural standpoint, it's a it's a interesting problem and and solution. And yeah, like I said, I I don't think algae are are some kind of silver bullet, but they represent an alternative nutrition source that has a nutrition profile that's can be similar to pollen depending on the algae and its production conditions.

Becky Masterman

I always like to remind our listeners that honey bees are our livestock, but if you look into the livestock industry, the advancement in nutrition was well ahead of of where we've been in honey bees and and people like you, researchers like you are are playing ketchup. But could you talk a little bit about like other livestock? This isn't just new to honey bees, so other livestock are also including the blue-green algae and diet supplements too, correct?

Dr. Vincent Ricigliano

Yeah, that's right. Yeah. So poultry industry, aquaculture industry are using, you know, a certain percentage of algae. And their foods, like I said, it's highly bio bioavailable, rich in all kinds of nutrients besides just macronutrients, but micronutrients. And uh yeah, you're right, you know, other agricultural sectors, other livestock sectors, they've really uh many of them or most of them have perfected these their supplemental feats. Whereas, you know, bee research is pretty is lagging behind both livestock sectors and even companion animals, which we have these complete diets where dogs and cats could eat the same thing for their entire lives.

and you know live a long, healthy life without disease. And so yeah, there's a lot of work to be done in the area of benutrition. And I I think, you know, like I said, picking algae as kind of uh potential nutrition source and exploring it that way is one approach. Another approach that my lab has kind of shifted gears to right now is deconstructing pollen, breaking pollen down into its constituents and trying to reconstruct it again in an artificial diet and seeing, you know, okay, if we were to remove this fraction from the pollen and or these compounds from the pollen and put it into an artificial diet, just those fractions. How do bees survive and respond?

And you know, what are their immune responses look like? Well, how long do they live compared to these things? And kind of systematically, it says the systematic deconstruction and reconstruction of pollen, I think, is what we need to to truly replicate it in a in a pollen substitute diet.

Becky Masterman

I'm just curious, you're talking about deconstructing pollen, but immediately I was like, oh, so you can get pollen with or th the ingredients in pollen, but you don't have the pesticide contamination. Does that play a role in in the research that you do, the experiments you do, when you're looking at comparing the what the the bee health with their the artificial diet versus actual pollen supplement, because pollen supplement could also be contaminated with pesticides if it's actually just collected pollen.

Dr. Vincent Ricigliano

Again, yeah, that that's another major issue, right? Not only contaminated with pesticides, but you know, perhaps pathogens too. So that's that's a major concern for collected pollen. What was the source of that pollen? Where were the plants growing? Where that pollen was sourced from? Were the soils contaminated with heavy metals? Is that somehow bioaccumulating in the pollen itself? There's yeah, there's a lot of A lot of questions about if you could purchase large quantities of cheap pollen and yeah, what is the quality of that pollen?

Jeff Ott

What's the uh the amino acid comparison between natural pollen and say the algae and how well it digests?

Dr. Vincent Ricigliano

It looks really good. In fact, the algae seems to be, especially in some of the studies we've done with spirulina and chlorella, the algae is highly, the protein in algae is highly bioavailable to bees The amino acid profiles are pretty similar. We've we have publications that compare them side by side. So they're they're worth that that's worth taking a look at to the listeners. The one issue that we've run into with developing some of these algae-based diets is that um there's a certain limit to how much algae can be in incorporated into the diet before bees become, you know, not as interested in it. So it just becomes less palatable. The higher the concentration, the less palatable it is.

And we see that across other animals too. So, you know, f some sort of the addition of some sort of feeding stimulant, phago stimulants again, like why is pollen so attractive to bees? Is it some volatiles? Is it, you know, lipids? I think it's probably actually I know that it's a it's kind of a comp a complex combination of all of these things. But we've tried we're we're actively trying to isolate some of the phago stimulants or feeding stimulants in pollen, and we're finding that they come from a few different classes of molecules.

Becky Masterman

Do you know of any anything that you are feeding to them? Is there anything that they actually will put into the cells or is it like they do pollen or or is it just consumed? or removed from the colony because that could be part of it too is is where they're storing their groceries. And pollen they're just used to putting into the cells so that it's readily available. But if you feed 'em a supplement Are they storing any of it?

Dr. Vincent Ricigliano

It depends. You know, sometimes we'll see, and it's very obvious when it comes to uh the algae because their algae patties are green, right? So you could kind of see Some green. Occasionally we'll see it stored uh in cells, yes. I think uh it's hard to understand like what causes the storage or what stimulates storage versus consumption versus you know.

Jeff Ott

Your comment about they having their fill of algae. I can probably relate to that. I I would say, okay, that's enough That's enough algae.

Dr. Vincent Ricigliano

Yeah, there there comes a point where it's just not as attractive anymore. So it's like finding a finding that balance. But the thing is, they don't need to consume as much algae uh because the protein is so bioavailable. that uh you could see in our summer some of our publications that bees will consume significantly less of algae or significantly less of anything compared to natural pollen. Yet when compared to when comparing beasts that have consumed pollen versus algae, they could consume less than half as much and still build up the same nutritional stores in their bodies.

I guess uh an important benefit of this algae platform too goes beyond nutrition because once we once we started looking at algae as kind of a nutritional platform the the next obvious question was could algae do more than just provide nutrition? So now we could kind of shift gears a little bit to RNAI or RNA interference.

Jeff Ott

Since we're switching topics or segueing away, let's take this opportunity for a quick break, hear from our sponsors, and we'll be right back after these words.

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Becky Masterman

Welcome back, everybody. Okay, Vincent, as promised, let's talk about some of your newest work, the RNAI technology.

Dr. Vincent Ricigliano

When we started looking at algae as a nutritional platform, the next obvious question was, you know, can this algae do more than just provide nutrition, right? And this brings us to the concept of functional feeds and functional foods. Right. So in human nutrition and and even other livestock nutrition, foods that kind of provide some sort of benefit to the organism beyond just their macro and micro micronutrient profiles So, for instance, algae can be engineered to produce things like double-stranded RNA. And this is what kind of led us into this area of RNA interference or RNAI.

And RNAI is a natural biological process where RNA molecules can specifically suppress the expression of target genes in the organism. So in simple terms, it's a way to biologically target very specific genes or pathogens or pests. So one of the major viral problems in honey bees is to form wing virus or DWV. And it's become especially damaging because mites very efficiently transmit it and amplify the virus throughout colonies. So we started exploring whether engineered algae could act as both a nutritional feed ingredient. and delivery platform for antiviral RNA molecules targeting DWV. One of the major challenges with RNAI technologies is deliverability or is delivery and scalability.

Uh so how do you economically deliver these molecules to thousands of bee colonies? And one way that's possible is algae. As I mentioned before, the growth of algae is very scalable, very sustainable. And bees can potentially consume the algae bees can consume this algae biomass directly. So instead of producing, say, purified pharmaceutical style double-stranded RNA, the algae itself can function as the feed and the delivery vehicle for these antibiral RNAs to to honey bees and honey bee colonies. So it's still an area of active research, but the the early proof of concept is is out there and and published.

And we have a patent application and and we're trying and a commercial partner who's interested in commercializing it. And so we're just trying to understand a bit more about how this could be regulated and What other viruses can we target with it? But in in general, in in this publication that's currently out there, I think it was 2000 24 bees fed these algae-based diets pr that produced the antiviral RNAs, they showed reduced virus levels and improved survival following a virus challenge. So bees were Fed these special algae diets that were engineered to as essentially edible antiviral treatments.

And then they were injected with deformed wing virus to stimulate to simulate the natural transmission mechanism of deformed wing virus through virillomites. And yeah, bees that were fed it had reduced virus levels and lived significantly longer.

Becky Masterman

And that's just so critical because if Beekeepers from the way back remember when Varroa first came to the United States, the n number or percent infestation that the bees could handle was so high compared to the number they can handle now because of the viruses. And so taking a mitigating some of the v the viral activity could be a game changer for I haven't the amount of control you have to do for your Varroa Because it veril are bad, but it's the viruses that are are just really rapidly escalating the viral problem

Dr. Vincent Ricigliano

Yeah. I want to emphasize, of course, again, there's no silver bullet in beekeeping and and nutrition alone won't solve a lot of these issues and RNA alone won't solve a lot of these issues, but improving nutrition and developing better disease management tools like this, you know, engineered algae proof of concept that we have shows that, you know these newer management tools developed through biotechnology can work together as part of an integrated approach.

Jeff Ott

In these trials it's delivered as a feed or as a paddy?

Dr. Vincent Ricigliano

As a feed, yeah. So as a sugar caddy.

Becky Masterman

Are they as pretty as the ones that you shared with me a couple of years ago? They're really pretty panties.

Dr. Vincent Ricigliano

Yeah, you know, uh the engineered algae, of course, we we weren't We haven't been able to deploy this in the field yet. In the lab, yeah. It it looks very similar in color. These these kind of blue green.

Jeff Ott

How else is this being used to improve honey bee health?

Dr. Vincent Ricigliano

Yeah, we're exploring it to target other viruses and even other viruses simultaneously, and we're also using it to target varilla. So You guys and your listeners are probably aware of the first commercial RAI product on the market right now for control of Arilla. That product is essentially a purified RNA molecule that targets through reproduction. This algae platform is just another means of producing and delivering double-stranded RNA to honey bee colonies. And I I wouldn't say it's directly comparable.

It's just another tool in the toolbox that's pretty early in its development But again represents an interesting concept that like what if the food itself can produce be the source of producing this and could that eventually be cheaper and more sustainable way of of producing double stranded RNA. Like right now, the algae can't produce nearly as much double stranded RNA as, you know, uh some of these Some of these companies are able to produce, but but what it can do is produce double stranded RNA cheaply on a large scale Using just light and nutrient salts and water.

Jeff Ott

The RNAI technology, is this still based on with the algae or is this separate from the algae?

Dr. Vincent Ricigliano

So RNAI is kind of like a core competency of my lab, right? And we we are exploring a few different ways to produce the double-stranded RNA. The double-stranded RNA is like the effector molecule that induces the RNAI response And there's a lot of different ways you can produce it. You could produce it on a large scale using something called in vitro RNA synthesis, where essentially like these double-stranded RNAs are produced and test tubes or large vats without the use of a living organism to produce them. And an alternative approach is what we're one of the things we're doing in my lab is producing them inside of a living system.

It just so happens that this living system that we're producing them in is also edible. So it doesn't require the double-stranded RNAs don't require purification. They can be grown up on a large scale and fed directly to bees.

Jeff Ott

I'm imagining when I'm going back to my ten gallon aquariums growing up and scraping off the algae of the side, is it is like vat size of a thing or is it big monstrous vats?

Dr. Vincent Ricigliano

Well we we've we've experimented with both, right? So right now we do a lot of well, we we've done a lot of pilot scale stuff, right? And the idea is to produce enough to do the experiments, to establish the proof of concept. and develop the technology and then hopefully a commercial partner comes in and dedicates an entire facility to the production of this the production of this algae. So we we're working on producing the double-stranded RNAs in Spirulina right now. It's the most commercially and industrially important blue-green algae, so there's a lot of infrastructure already to produce it.

It's it's a bit expensive right now to produce compared to other algae, but that's only because it's produced kind of at For a at human grade as opposed to say feed grade like most other pollen substitute ingredients. So Yeah, working on production methods and and how to drive the price down.

Becky Masterman

Do you have field trials scheduled?

Dr. Vincent Ricigliano

We're we're working on that. Yeah. So like I said, we're working with a commercial partner now who's gonna hopefully fund this field trial. And we even have a facility that's capable of producing enough material for a field trial. But we're still ironing out the details and and funding of of that.

Becky Masterman

Do you have to do this at a certain time of the season? Do you does it would it have to be like a spring start to it? Uh I guess it depends on the location.

Dr. Vincent Ricigliano

You know, ideally the feed could be applied during somewhat of a dearth period, um, when feed whenever feed would typically be applied uh for the particular operation or management goals and we'll ideally be working with a few different commercial beekeepers to to test this in in the future.

Jeff Ott

It'd be interesting to learn when the effective treatment schedule for this uh approach and what is it uh once a year, is it multiple times a year, how long it remains in effect throughout the colony?

Dr. Vincent Ricigliano

We've been thinking about that a bit. I would think that it would require multiple applications, just because you know, the the RNAI, according to the literature and the few studies that have applied RNAI to colonies in the field, like It persists for some time, but I think we'll probably require multiple applications, I guess depending on oh lots of things, might levels and seasonality and management goals. So yeah. A field trial is a bit is on the horizon. We're still, like I said, uh trying to dial in some important considerations for that. Most important consideration being money. Uh we have companies trying to you know secure venture capital and yeah to fund this all.

In the meantime though, uh where it's a bit more difficult to you know, pull off a field trial of this because it requires, you know, a dedicated facility to produce large enough quantities for a field trial. We also work with RNAI that doesn't require algae. So we work with something called naked double-stranded RNA, which is just purified double-stranded RNA, and we use it for different applications, including antiviral applications and including mite applications.

So as you and the listeners know, there's a commercially available mite treatment right now that uses that relies on RNAI and uh we are testing different targets in mites, specifically targets that are lethal that could either just directly kill the mite, but we're also interested in using RNAI to better understand and potentially mitigate uh resistance to certain mitocides like amitraz. So we know that amitraz resistance is a is a major issue right now. In fact, it was shown to have a significant presence, or at least genotypes for resistant mites were pretty prevalent in recent colony surveys of collapsing colonies over the last couple of years.

One way we're using RNAI is to what if we could turn off genes in the mite that make them resistant to certain mitocides? And by doing this, we could extend the effective life of those mitocides. for the beekeeping industry. So we're kind of using RNAI tools in different ways.

This way I just described to kind of understand and mitigate mitocide resistance is more of like a stopgap measure You know, instead of registering new mitocides, which can take a long time, perhaps a synergist uh like the one I'm describing can um just extend the the life uh and usability of mitocides like amitraz until we could develop totally chemical-free approaches perhaps rely on RNAI that could just directly kill mites.

Becky Masterman

I need a map here. So you're doing molecular work. You're doing nutrition work including growing the organism. Are you farming out the viral analysis of of the virus data? Are you is another lab doing that? Where are you doing that too?

Dr. Vincent Ricigliano

Oh no, we do all the yeah, we we do all our molecular data and virus analysis in house.

Becky Masterman

You do. So I think we wanted to review that, Vincent.

Dr. Vincent Ricigliano

Yeah. We'll be we'll be down next week. What are you doing? Come on come on over anytime, really. Uh you guys are welcome. We might have to sign some stuff and

Becky Masterman

But it's a lot for one lab to do. I mean that's we do a lot. Yeah, you do, right? I I'm I'm right, right?

Dr. Vincent Ricigliano

We're we're we're busy, you know, but I have to say over the last year or so, especially since relocating. Uh it's been a little difficult to hire people right now. You know, we've kind of honed our focus a bit and the nutrition work is taken a bit of a back seat as I wait for new postdocs to join the lab. And, you know, we we tried to just hone our focus on just mites and viruses at the moment. And I'm eager to get back to nutrition. But you know, our the beekeepers, our stakeholders, they want solutions to mites and viruses, and they want those solutions Yesterday. Years ago.

Jeff Ott

Forty years ago.

Dr. Vincent Ricigliano

Yeah.

Becky Masterman

Are you also managing your own your own colonies? Are you are you getting the The bees from your own apiary? Okay. Wow.

Dr. Vincent Ricigliano

Yeah, so and and we work with commercial beekeepers too. So uh we're very fortunate, of course, being in Davis and in the Central Valley, kind of the the epicenter of you know, pollination in the US. We're fortunate to work with some very cooperative commercial beekeepers We really like the idea of testing our treatments in their bees, right? These bees have kind of been exposed to commercial conditions, commercial management. It's it's nice to be able to test treatments. And if they work, then well that's we're already kind of where the rubber hits the road, we're already testing these treatments in commercial commercially managed bees.

So uh yes, we do maintain some of our own colonies, but we also work closely with commercial beekeepers.

Jeff Ott

Yeah, you are in a a great location to have access to. Very cooperative and very friendly beekeepers who have the resource to help you out. That's fantastic.

Dr. Vincent Ricigliano

Yeah, there there's no shortage of bee colonies and there's no shortage of mites or viruses here in California.

Jeff Ott

So

Dr. Vincent Ricigliano

Yes.

Jeff Ott

If you run out, like let me know. There's a lot I can I I can give you several colonies here.

Becky Masterman

I was just gonna mention that Vincent has also worked with Randy Oliver and published with him. So it's kind of fun. They've partnered.

Dr. Vincent Ricigliano

Yeah, Randy Randy does uh live somewhat close by and see him pretty regularly and so is a great resource. Um Good to chat with Randy. In fact, it reminds me I should probably give him a call.

Becky Masterman

Those those have to be intense chats, Vincent.

Dr. Vincent Ricigliano

They're not just a chat, are they? It's never no it's never just a chat. Absolutely. Oh absolutely a hundred percent.

Jeff Ott

Well, Dr. Vincent We really appreciate talking to you today. We're coming up the end of the hour. Is there anything that you want to talk about that we haven't? Or can you give us a little peek at the next discussion we have with you? down the road.

Dr. Vincent Ricigliano

Yeah, how about how about a peek at the next discussion down the road? Uh so fantastic. We we have a review article published just last year. It's called Harnessing Biotechnology for Bee Pollinator Health. Rina, we we essentially lay out a roadmap for how we can use modern biotechnology, modern molecular biology, genomics to develop better, smarter tools. to help bees deal with some of the help bees deal with some of the biggest modern stressors that they're dealing with in ways that don't necessarily rely on chemical inputs and and hopefully are a bit cleaner and more sustainable. Yeah, tools tools towards more sustainable beekeeping that ensure that beekeeping has a future

Jeff Ott

Well we really enjoyed it's I can't believe how quickly this time has passed. We look forward to having you back. Boy, even a possible future tour that'll have there in Davis.

Becky Masterman

Um See how I invited us?

Jeff Ott

Yeah, that's fantastic.

Dr. Vincent Ricigliano

Yeah.

Jeff Ott

We look forward to having you back. Talk to you soon.

Dr. Vincent Ricigliano

Thanks a lot for having me.

Jeff Ott

That was really fun. Who knew? Well, we knew. We have sponsors, but Who knew? Blue-green algae is is so important and is so useful for the honey bees and not only as feet and as a carrier.

Becky Masterman

Right. is to get rid of the vectors. But how exciting if they've found another great way. So that's exciting. And I will say we were I I was talking to Vera from Strong Microbials, speaking of sponsors, at the was it the Bee Expo, the North American or the was it the Midwest mid was it the Midwest Bee Honey Bee Expo and Vera told me, she said, Yeah, I have to have Vincent on the show. He's he's so smart. He's doing such great work and boy She was spot on. So thank you, Vera. Thank you, thank you.

Jeff Ott

I learned a lot. I look forward to having Vincent back in the in the research they're doing down there at the USDAARS lab in at Davis, California. It's gonna be so important to our ongoing health of our honey bees, especially as ne pollen issues and habitat issues and pest and pestilence disease.

Becky Masterman

But you know But you know, that I love I love how this they kept putting it into context and as far as this is what the stakeholders need, this is what beekeepers need. They they need solutions and there are long-term solutions, there are are short-term solutions that might might be really helpful. And so how lucky are we that that he went from Was it floral symmetry? And and he floral symmetry he ended up in the world of of bees, beekeeping, blue algae, bee health. I mean, yeah. We're lu we're lucky. So That was like a good catch for the bee industry. Good on the USDA for hiring him as a postdoc and then keeping him on.

Jeff Ott

And that about wraps it up for this episode of Beekeeping Today. Before we go, be sure to follow us and leave us a five-star rating on Apple Podcasts. or wherever you stream the show. Even better, write a quick review to help other beekeepers discover what you enjoy. You can get there directly from our website by clicking on the reviews tab on the top of any page. We want to thank Better B, our presenting sponsor, for their ongoing support of the podcast. We also appreciate our longtime sponsors, Global Patties, Strong Microbials, and Northern Bee Books for their support in bringing you each week's episode. And most importantly, thank you for the next video.

for listening and spending time with us. If you have any questions or feedback, just head over to our website and drop us a note. We'd love to hear from you. Thanks again everybody!