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The Robinson lab uses the honey bee as a model to study the mechanisms governing social life. Homo sapiens is a highly social species and social interactions are critical determinants of human mental and physical health. Though phylogenetically distant, honey bees live in societies that rival our own in complexity, internal cohesion, and success in dealing with the myriad challenges posed by social life, including those related to communication, aging, social dysfunction and infectious disease.
Robinson spearheaded the effort to secure approval for a honey bee genome project, and in May 2002, the National Human Genome Research Institute (NHGRI) gave high priority to the White Paper to Sequence the Honey Bee Genome. NHGRI explicitly accepted the core premise of the White Paper. Sequencing began in December 2002, and the project was completed in 2006. The annotated genome of the honey bee is enabling us to use this model in proteomic analyses of neural and behavioral plasticity.
A new project uses honey bees and related, less social species to understand in molecular terms how to "flip" brain reward systems, from selfish to altruistic behavior. This project involves integrated proteomic and genomic analysis. It is hoped that results from this project will provide insights into drug addiction and other diseases of the reward system.
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