Sniffer bees or sniffer wasps are

insect Insects (from Latin ') are Hexapoda, hexapod invertebrates of the class (biology), class Insecta. They are the largest group within the arthropod phylum. Insects have a chitinous exoskeleton, a three-part body (Insect morphology#Head, head, ...

s in the

order Order, ORDER or Orders may refer to: * A socio-political or established or existing order, e.g. World order, Ancien Regime, Pax Britannica * Categorization, the process in which ideas and objects are recognized, differentiated, and understood ...

Hymenoptera Hymenoptera is a large order of insects, comprising the sawflies, wasps, bees, and ants. Over 150,000 living species of Hymenoptera have been described, in addition to over 2,000 extinct ones. Many of the species are parasitic. Females typi ...

that can be trained to perform a variety of tasks to detect substances such as

explosive material An explosive (or explosive material) is a reactive substance that contains a great amount of potential energy that can produce an explosion if released suddenly, usually accompanied by the production of light, heat, sound, and pressure. An exp ...

s or

illegal drugs Illegal may refer to: Law * Violation of law ** Crime In ordinary language, a crime is an unlawful act punishable by a State (polity), state or other authority. The term ''crime'' does not, in modern criminal law, have any simple and uni ...

, as well as some human and plant

disease A disease is a particular abnormal condition that adversely affects the structure or function (biology), function of all or part of an organism and is not immediately due to any external injury. Diseases are often known to be medical condi ...

s. The sensitivity of the

olfactory The sense of smell, or olfaction, is the special sense through which smells (or odors) are perceived. The sense of smell has many functions, including detecting desirable foods, hazards, and pheromones, and plays a role in taste. In humans, it ...

senses of

bee Bees are winged insects closely related to wasps and ants, known for their roles in pollination and, in the case of the best-known bee species, the western honey bee, for producing honey. Bees are a monophyletic lineage within the superfamil ...

s and

wasp A wasp is any insect of the narrow-waisted suborder Apocrita of the order Hymenoptera which is neither a bee nor an ant; this excludes the broad-waisted sawflies (Symphyta), which look somewhat like wasps, but are in a separate suborder ...

s in particular has been shown to rival the abilities of

sniffer dog Sniffer may refer to: * Packet analyzer (aka network analyzer, protocol analyzer or sniffer), computer software or hardware that can intercept and log traffic passing over a digital network *The trademark for the original Network General Sniffer ...

s, though they can only be trained to detect a single scent each.

Intelligence

Ethologist

Karl von Frisch Karl Ritter von Frisch, (20 November 1886 – 12 June 1982) was a German-Austrian ethology, ethologist who received the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1973, along with Nikolaas Tinbergen and Konrad Lorenz. His work centered on investi ...

dedicated much of his career to the study of the sensory perceptions of the

honey bee A honey bee (also spelled honeybee) is a eusocial flying insect within the genus ''Apis'' of the bee clade, all native to mainland Afro-Eurasia. After bees spread naturally throughout Africa and Eurasia, humans became responsible for the ...

and was one of the first people to translate the meaning of the

waggle dance Waggle dance is a term used in beekeeping and ethology for a particular figure-eight dance of the honey bee. By performing this dance, successful foragers can share information about the direction and distance to patches of flowers yielding ne ...

. His studies show that bees can count to five and have the capacity to be trained to visit specific feeding stations at certain times of day.Halter, Reese
Bees: man's best friend, provider and protector
2 November 2010. Accessed 6 October 2011.

Odour detection

Bees and wasps are trained using

classical conditioning Classical conditioning (also respondent conditioning and Pavlovian conditioning) is a behavioral procedure in which a biologically potent Stimulus (physiology), stimulus (e.g. food, a puff of air on the eye, a potential rival) is paired with a n ...

, being exposed to a particular odour and then rewarded with a sugar solution.Hodgson, Martin
Sniffer bees: New flying squad in war against terror
. ''

The Independent ''The Independent'' is a British online newspaper. It was established in 1986 as a national morning printed paper. Nicknamed the ''Indy'', it began as a broadsheet and changed to tabloid format in 2003. The last printed edition was publis ...

''. 7 May 2006. Accessed 6 October 2011. Within five minutes they learn to associate the smell with an impending supply of food and this triggers the

proboscis extension reflex Proboscis extension reflex (PER) is the extension by an insect with an extendable proboscis (e.g. a bee or fly) of her proboscis (sticking out of her tongue) as a reflex to antennal stimulation. It is evoked when a sugar solution is touched to a bee ...

(sticking out their tongues).Trained Wasps May Be Used To Detect Bombs, Bugs, Bodies And More
''

Science Daily ''ScienceDaily'' is an American website launched in 1995 that aggregates press releases and publishes lightly edited press releases (a practice called churnalism) about science, similar to Phys.org and EurekAlert!. History The site was f ...

''. 21 October 2005. Accessed 6 October 2011. Trained hymenopterans have been shown to successfully detect explosive materials including

TNT Troponin T (shortened TnT or TropT) is a part of the troponin complex, which are proteins integral to the contraction of skeletal and heart muscles. They are expressed in skeletal and cardiac myocytes. Troponin T binds to tropomyosin and helps ...

Semtex Semtex is a general-purpose plastic explosive containing RDX and PETN. It is used in commercial blasting, demolition, and in certain military applications. Semtex was developed and manufactured in Czechoslovakia, originally under the name B 1 a ...

, and C-4 as well as

gunpowder Gunpowder, also commonly known as black powder to distinguish it from modern smokeless powder, is the earliest known chemical explosive. It consists of a mixture of sulfur, charcoal (which is mostly carbon), and potassium nitrate, potassium ni ...

and

propellant A propellant (or propellent) is a mass that is expelled or expanded in such a way as to create a thrust or another motive force in accordance with Newton's third law of motion, and "propel" a vehicle, projectile, or fluid payload. In vehicle ...

s.Detecting Explosives With Honeybees: Experts Develop Method To Train Air Force Of Bomb-Sniffing Bees
''Science Daily''. 29 November 2006. Accessed 6 October 2011. Wasps can be trained to detect the early signs of fungal disease on crops and may have medicinal value, identifying people with cancer just by being exposed to their breath.Hall, Mimi

USA Today ''USA Today'' (often stylized in all caps) is an American daily middle-market newspaper and news broadcasting company. Founded by Al Neuharth in 1980 and launched on September 14, 1982, the newspaper operates from Gannett's corporate headq ...

. 26 December 2005. Accessed 6 October 2011. Bees have been shown to detect and respond to more than 60 different odours including

methamphetamine Methamphetamine (contracted from ) is a potent central nervous system (CNS) stimulant that is mainly used as a recreational drug use, recreational or Performance-enhancing substance, performance-enhancing drug and less commonly as a secon ...

uranium Uranium is a chemical element; it has chemical symbol, symbol U and atomic number 92. It is a silvery-grey metal in the actinide series of the periodic table. A uranium atom has 92 protons and 92 electrons, of which 6 are valence electrons. Ura ...

, and

tuberculosis Tuberculosis (TB), also known colloquially as the "white death", or historically as consumption, is a contagious disease usually caused by ''Mycobacterium tuberculosis'' (MTB) bacteria. Tuberculosis generally affects the lungs, but it can al ...

. They have been used to detect lung and skin cancers, diabetes, and to confirm pregnancy. It is not known if they can detect potential seizures in humans. Researchers at the

University of Georgia The University of Georgia (UGA or Georgia) is a Public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university with its main campus in Athens, Georgia, United States. Chartered in 1785, it is the oldest public university in th ...

have built a device named the "Wasp Hound" which contains the

parasitic wasp Parasitoid wasps are a large group of hymenopteran superfamilies, with all but the wood wasps ( Orussoidea) being in the wasp-waisted Apocrita. As parasitoids, they lay their eggs on or in the bodies of other arthropods, sooner or later causi ...

species '' Microplitis croceipes''. The insects normally walk around the PVC pipe in which they are housed but begin to migrate towards the source of an odour when it is the one that they were trained to recognise. These movements are tracked by a computer, with small cameras inside the device sending images for processing. Within 30 seconds of the wasps beginning to congregate near an odour source an alarm is sounded.Appel, Adrianne
Drug-Sniffing Wasps May Sting Crooks
''

National Geographic ''National Geographic'' (formerly ''The National Geographic Magazine'', sometimes branded as ''Nat Geo'') is an American monthly magazine published by National Geographic Partners. The magazine was founded in 1888 as a scholarly journal, nine ...

''. 27 October 2005. Accessed 6 October 2011.

References

External links

The early bee catches the flower - circadian rhythmicity influences learning performance in honey bees, Apis mellifera
31 July 2010.

December 2003.
First evidence of fine colour discrimination ability in ants (Hymenoptera, Formicidae)Bees help in the battle against tuberculosis
{{Webarchive, url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120201143306/http://www.3news.co.nz/Bees-help-in-the-battle-against-tuberculosis/tabid/1160/articleID/230861/Default.aspx , date=2012-02-01 , 3 News. 27 October 2011. Animal training Apocrita