Michelle Dickinson: nanotechnologist on the research that bees can survive underwater for days without drowning

Sometimes, the most exciting scientific discoveries don’t come from carefully planned experiments, they come from accidents.

A scientist was storing hibernating bumblebee queens in a refrigerator. These bees were in a deep resting state called diapause which is basically a kind of suspended animation that helps them survive winter.

Condensation from the fridge dripped into the containers, leaving the bees submerged in water, by the time they were found, it was assumed they had drowned, but they hadn’t which led to the question, can bees can survive underwater? The results were published in the journal Royal Society Proceedings B.

Bumblebees don’t have lungs, and like most insects they breathe through tiny openings in their bodies connected to tubes that deliver oxygen directly to their tissues. If those openings are blocked, for example with water, you would expect the bee to run out of oxygen pretty quickly.

To figure out how they survived, the researchers placed hibernating queen bees in water and carefully measured how much carbon dioxide (CO₂) they produced.

They found that the bees reduced their metabolism by more than half, producing 75 percent less CO₂ almost immediately and their metabolism continued to slow over time .

But that wasn’t the whole story. The researchers also found signs that the bees were partially switching to anaerobic metabolism which is a way of producing energy without oxygen (similar to what happens in your muscles during intense exercise). This process isn’t ideal long-term but it can keep organisms alive in tough conditions.

And there was one more clever trick.

Scientists believe the bees may be using something called a “physical gill.” This is a thin layer of air that clings to the bee’s body underwater, allowing oxygen to diffuse in and carbon dioxide to diffuse out. It’s a bit like carrying your own tiny oxygen bubble.

When removed from the water, the bees slowly woke up over several days and carried on as normal.

This discovery could have real implications as bumblebee queens often hibernate underground, sometimes in areas that flood.  

This ability to survive underwater could be a crucial survival strategy and reminds us that insects are far more resilient than we give them credit for. 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:06):
You're listening to the Sunday Session podcast with Francesca Rudgin
from News Talks.

Speaker 2 (00:11):
Edbe doctor Michelle Dickinson. Good morning, Good morning bumblebees. We
all love a bumblebee, don't we. We love them. And
this is like a happy ever after story about the bumblebee.
Turns out they were even cleverer than we thought they were.
And what I love is usually I bring you in
scientific research. And you know, some scientists has like planned
it for their whole lifetime, applied for millions of grants,

(00:32):
finally got it funded and put it through. This research
happened by accident, and that's my favorite type of research.
I love it. And it started sad but ended up happy.
So researchers were looking at bumblebees, especially queen bees, who hibernate,
and they stored them in a fridge to watch them hibernate. Basically,
the bees got cold, they hibernated, and the plan was,

(00:55):
after a while, see how long they hibernate for and
then pull them out Apart from here's what happened. The
bees were happily hibernating. It's called it's not called hibernation
in bees, it's called deep resting they were doing, and
the scientists didn't realize that condensation from the fridge was
dripping into the containers that the bees were in, leaving
the bees fully submerged in water, and somebody opened the

(01:18):
fridge to check on the bees. They were in water,
and they went, oh, no, all of our bees have drowned.
And everybody panicked, and so they were like, well, that's
very sad. Our science experiment is over. So they pulled
the bees out, poured the water away, and lo and behold,
the bees were not dead. They woke up and they
were perfectly fine, and scientists weren't hot. On a minute,

(01:40):
there's a science project there. Why are my bees not dead?
So that's where the study came from. It's published in
the Royal Society Publishing Proceedings be if you want to
read it, and I love science by accident. So, bees
don't have lungs. They basically breathe through these little holes
in their side of their body. And usually if there's
holes are blocked, they can't get oxygen into their body.

(02:01):
So surely water would fill those holes. So they they
literally guilds like little yeah, like little holes. Yeah, So
that's how their oxygen gets in, and so they did
this again. They basically took the bees, hibernated them, put
them in the fridge, and then put them in water.
Hope it wasn't one off one of And actually they
measured carbon dioxide levels and they found that in this

(02:24):
hibernation state, this state where they don't move very much,
actually the bees produce seventy five percent less carbon dioxide.
So basically the whole metabolism shuts down. We've seen this
in bears two when bears hibernating caves. Basically that all
their body functions just become this tiny minimum level. Then
actually the amount of oxygen that they needed was tiny anyway,

(02:44):
so the fact that these holes were blocked didn't matter
so much. Secondly, they found that bees, like people, can
actually use a different type of metabolism and move to
anaerobic metabolism. Anaerobic is what basically when you're exercising and
you're puffing in your panting. It is that same thing. Now,
they can't do it forever because like in humans, they
get a build up of lactic acid, but they can

(03:05):
do it for sure period. So they found that not
enough oxygen in that's fine. They didn't need too much,
and they can do this anaerobic metabolism. But here's the thing.
Bees are fluffy, and what they found is the fluffiness
of bees meant that the water didn't quite touch their
body but instead left a little air pocket. I don't

(03:25):
know if you've ever put anything fluffy in the bathtub,
but you see that, like little air bubbles get caught
between the surface and the fluff. Yeah, well that's what happened.
And so these little bees had a little air pocket
around their body that they could pull the little so
their tubes weren't blocked. They could pull oxygen from it,
and they've called it a physical gill in this story,
but basically it's a little like a little oxygen bubble.

(03:49):
So does the does this only work if they're in
the deep resting state? Definitely don't into And they only
did atween bees, which most people won't have. So this
is a very specific state for a very specific bee.
So please don't take your bee and dunk it and
see if it will drown. It will drown. But in
this case, because they were in this hibernation state and

(04:11):
their metabolism was so reduced and they had this little
bubble of air around them that they could breathe and
get their oxygen from. The bees survived, Hurrah. And you know,
here's another n ST that is a lot more resilient
than we thought. Bees are so cool and I just go,
it's another superpower. How cool is that? So well done
on the bees. What was a sad story ended up

(04:32):
being a new scientific discovery and the bees lived. I
love it. Thank you so much, Michelle. We'll catch up
next week for.

Speaker 1 (04:39):
More from the Sunday session with Francesca Rudken. Listen live
to news Talks It'd Bee from nine am Sunday, or
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