FILE PHOTO: A bee collects nectar from crocus during sunny winter weather, as the spread of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) continues, at a public park in Zurich, Switzerland, March 2, 2021. REUTERS/Arnd Wiegmann
AMSTERDAM — Dutch researchers have trained bees, which have an unusually keen sense of smell, to identify samples infected with COVID-19, a finding they said could cut waiting times for test results to just seconds.
To train the bees, scientists in the bio-veterinary research laboratory at Wageningen University gave them sugary water as a reward after showing them samples infected with COVID-19. They would get no reward after being shown a non-infected sample.
Having got used to the system, the bees were able to spontaneously extend their tongues to receive a reward when presented with an infected sample, said Wim van der Poel, a professor of virology who took part in the project.
“We collect normal honeybees from a beekeeper and we put the bees in harnesses,” he said. “Right after presenting a positive sample we also present them with sugar water. And what the bees do is they extend their proboscis to take the sugar water.”
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The extending of the bees’ straw-like tongues to drink is confirmation of a positive coronavirus test result, according to the researchers.
It can take hours or days to get a COVID-19 test result, but the response from the bees is immediate. The method is also cheap, potentially making it useful for countries where tests are scarce, they said.
