Task specialization of worker polyethism in honeybee colony

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To analyze the specialization on tasks by a honeybee workers from both genetic and behavioral backgrounds of the bee are determined. Our hypothesis is if genetic background takes part in the specialization, all workers in particular task should be in one patriline group and if behavioral background does, they show similar ethograms or behavioral patterns.As a specialist task we observed "undertaking" behavior. Because of the sample size was too small and kin-analysis using DNA-markers was not so clear, we could not unveil the contribution of genetic background on the specialization. Whereas, there were significant differences of lineup of behavioral contents and performance frequency of each content between workers that took specialized task and ones took only general tasks. Also specialized workers showed hypersensitive response against exogenous stimuli.Only 1 % of worker bees showed specialization, so specialization is thought to be subjected genetic background, rather it suggests that a portion of workers from (several) kin group (s) has set lower threshold to response and they are the potential specialists.It is necessary to use methods with higher sensitivity on DNA markers, and for this purpose we have introduced sequence-gel electrophoresis. Further we need another specialized task which can be observed in ordinary s-zed colony because the observation hive base sampling can limited the size of specialist samples.