Honey bees engage in the waggle dance to relay the location of a food source and encourage other worker bees in the hive to forage. While it has been long known that the steps of the dance convey information about where the food source is and how plentiful it is, it has been recently discovered that four pheromones (tricosane, (Z)-9-tricosene, pentacosane, and (Z)-9-pentacosene), are also given off during this dance. We have successfully synthesized (Z)-9-pentacosene, the only one of these compounds not commercially available, in a two-reaction process. We are in the process of quantifying the amount of each of these pheromones present in the hive during the dance from air samples collected from actively foraging hives using SPME (Solid Phase Micro Extraction) fibers by our collaborator, honey bee expert David Gilley of William Paterson University.

Synthesis and quantitation of the honey bee waggle dance pheromone (Z)-9-pentacosene

243rd National Meeting (2012)

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