EID: How Social Organization Influences an Infectious Process: The Honey Bee Colony As a Model

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This project aims to understand the influence of social organization on epidemiology, using the honey bee colony as a model. It is based on the hypothesis that the social network within a large group, which is fundamental to its integration, also makes it relatively easy for pathogens to sweep across the entire group. Such high susceptibility of social groups to epidemics also makes it likely that the design of the social network is under strong selection pressure to evolve a structure that impedes the transmission of pathogens. There may be segregating forces within the network that reduce the velocity of pathogen transmission or the network could flexibly alter its structure as a defensive response against an invading pathogen. Most of the current ideas in epidemiology are either theoretical or based on secondary data due to an obvious lack of experimental opportunities. The honey bee colony, with its highly complex social organization and a tremendous array of host-parasite interactions, provides a one-of-a-kind opportunity to further our understanding of epidemic phenomena. This bee colony is also highly amenable to experimental manipulations making it possible to study the treatment effects of numerous social and demographic variables on the spread of an epidemic. Such findings have enormous applications in designing disease prevention and control methods for any close-knit social group such as a crowded urban situation, especially given the current challenges posed by bioterrorism and emerging infectious diseases.