The threats are layered and interacting. Global warming imposes thermal stress on social and solitary bees alike, while habitat loss and introduced parasites compound the damage. Honey bees, Apis mellifera, the world’s most economically important pollinator, are particularly vulnerable to a suite of pressures, most notably the parasitic mite Varroa destructor and the viruses it carries and spreads. The eleven studies span climate impacts, parasite dynamics, bee genetics, hive microbiota, and ways to improve pollination efficiency as an agricultural service, and the editorial’s authors argue that only by examining these threads together can researchers support the well-being of bees worldwide.

Climate-induced heat stress is a growing threat to bee diversity, and solitary bees appear especially vulnerable because they cannot thermoregulate their nests. Vilchez-Russell and Rafferty’s contribution shows that heat stress reduces survival and adult emergence rates in solitary bees and alters body size, development time, sex ratios, and diapause, the dormant state many insects rely on to time their life cycles. Rising temperatures can also break the synchrony between bee emergence and floral resource availability, meaning bees may wake from diapause to find the flowers they depend on already gone. The editorial calls for habitat management that provides thermal refugia and integrated conservation planning that accounts for climate variability and species-specific resilience mechanisms.

Acosta and colleagues propose a methodological framework to identify priority zones for monitoring wild bee responses to climate change, using the Brazilian stingless bee Melipona fasciculata as a case study. Their approach classifies habitat into three types: Loss zones, which will become unsuitable for the species; Gain zones, which will become suitable; and Persistent zones, which remain suitable and are therefore best for long-term monitoring. By achieving better spatial precision for conservation measures, the framework offers conservationists a practical tool for deciding where to invest limited monitoring resources as climates shift.

Urban heat adds another dimension. The Urban Heat Island Effect refers to elevated temperatures in cities caused by human infrastructure such as buildings and roads, and it disproportionately affects ectothermic organisms such as bees. Polidori and colleagues note that temperature increases generally affect bee physiology, reduce foraging efficiency and reproductive success, and that specialists and thermosensitive species risk local extinction. Urban heat can also shift flowering times and resource availability, creating mismatches between bees and the plants they pollinate. The editorial argues that more comprehensive, multi-scalar research combining urban ecology, thermal biology, and pollination science is needed to inform urban biodiversity planning.

Bumble bee populations are declining globally, with climate warming identified as a key driver. Kevan and colleagues highlight a striking biological constraint: bumble bee colonies maintain a remarkably consistent brood rearing temperature across species and biogeographic regions, suggesting limited evolutionary plasticity. Bumble bees are more susceptible to heat stress than to cold, and while nest placement and structure significantly affect nest temperatures, few data exist on thermal gradients and insulation properties inside bumble bee nests. Understanding how bumble bee physiology, ecology, and nest architecture shape responses to climate change is therefore a research priority.

For honey bees, the devastating interplay of bees, Varroa mites, and viruses is a major cause of colony losses worldwide. Common beekeeping practices, such as splitting colonies and transporting hives, inadvertently facilitate virus and mite dispersal. Miticides help control mites but do not eliminate circulating viruses, and mite resistance to acaricides is a growing problem. Morfin and colleagues show that Varroa infestation reduces honey bee lifespan and exacerbates viral infections by suppressing bee immune responses and increasing virus titers, and unmanaged infestations can lead to colony collapse. The editorial stresses that effective bee health management requires tackling the synergistic threat posed by mites and viruses together rather than separately.

Resistance traits such as Varroa Sensitive Hygiene, in which worker bees detect and remove infested brood, hold potential for selective breeding programs aimed at mite resistance. Lester’s contribution examines how overuse and reliance on acaricides have driven the evolution of resistance in Varroa populations, and proposes strategies including rotating acaricides with different modes of action, applying treatments only when infestation thresholds are exceeded, and improving monitoring of resistance alleles. Beekeepers, researchers, and regulators are encouraged to work collaboratively to preserve the efficacy of current treatments while integrative approaches combining genomics, ecology, and behavior are developed into multifaceted solutions.

Advances in bee biology are also reshaping crop pollination. Owen’s study of chromosome diversity across the bee superfamily Apoidea reveals a wide range of haploid chromosome numbers, from three to twenty-eight, but a lack of data for many species makes it difficult to determine relationships and evolutionary pathways. Improved methods for preserving and analyzing chromosomes, including C-banding and FISH techniques, are advancing understanding of chromosomal rearrangement, and modern genomic tools can now explore the adaptive significance of chromosomal variation. Anderson and Copeland’s meta-analysis of 35 studies of honey bee hive microbiota found a distinct and relatively stable hive microbiome dominated by aerobic or aerotolerant bacteria, shared across larval, worker and queen mouthparts, worker crops and hypopharyngeal glands, queen crops and midguts, beebread, royal jelly, and honey. This microbiota contributes to the preservation of stored pollen and honey, inhibition of pathogens, and colony-level disease resistance, and the editorial argues it should be considered in colony health diagnostics.

Honey bees can also be trained. Farina and colleagues showed that bees can associate floral scents with food rewards, and once trained, they visit target crops more frequently, potentially enhancing pollination precision. Continued improvement of automated within-hive conditioning could make honey bees more effective agents of pollination services, though additional research is needed to determine viability for specific crops. On the conservation front, Oddie and Dahle and related work suggest that conflicts between beekeepers and conservationists over competition between wild and managed pollinators can give way to common ground: honey bees and wild pollinators face shared threats, beekeepers can serve as early detectors of environmental stressors, and superior fruit set and quality are obtained when wild and managed bees visit the same flowers, showing additive or synergistic effects. The editorial concludes that a coordinated international effort, incorporating changes in management practices, is needed to address the adverse conditions currently confronting bees, and that the next challenge is prioritizing and implementing the improvements these studies identify.

Subject of Research: Biology

Article Title: Editorial: Horizons in bee science

Article References: De Jong, D., Kevan, P. G., Imperatriz-Fonseca, V. L., Lester, P. J., Fahrbach, S. E., & Mayfield, M. M. (2025). Editorial: Horizons in bee science. Frontiers in Bee Science, 3, Article 1667590. https://doi.org/10.3389/frbee.2025.1667590

Image Credits: AI Generated

DOI: 10.3389/frbee.2025.1667590

Keywords: bees, pollination, climate change, Varroa destructor, honey bee, bumble bee, bee health, microbiome, Editorial, Horizons, science, scientific research