About

Etya Amsalem is an Associate Professor of Entomology at The Huck Institutes of the Life Sciences, Pennsylvania State University. Her research focuses on the evolutionary development and mechanistic basis of social behavior in insects, utilizing an integrative approach that encompasses chemical, genetic, and physiological tools. She is affiliated with multiple research centers, including the Center for Pollinator Research, the Center for Chemical Ecology, the Insect Biodiversity Center, and the Neuroscience Institute. Her work investigates key aspects of social insect biology, such as reproductive signaling, pheromone production and detection, and the impacts of environmental factors like pesticides and carbon dioxide on insect behavior and physiology.

Research topics

• Ecology
• Zoology
• Biology
• Developmental psychology
• Psychology

Selected publications

• The making of a queen: Hormonal regulation of female caste in the social bee Bombus impatiens

  Insect Biochemistry and Molecular Biology · 2026-04-12

  articleSenior author
  PublisherDOI

• Do bumble bees make optimal nutritional choices?

  Journal of Insect Physiology · 2025-05-20

  article1st authorCorresponding
  PublisherDOI

• Author response for "Gyne production is regulated by the brood in a social bee ( <i>Bombus impatiens</i> )"

  2025-07-01

  peer-review1st authorCorresponding
  PublisherDOI

• Male attraction to short-range multimodal gyne signals in the bumblebees Bombus impatiens

  Discover Animals · 2025-10-27

  articleOpen accessSenior author

  Mating is a crucial event in animal life, with significant implications for individual fitness. Insects have evolved complex mating systems and behaviors, such as pheromone signaling and elaborate courtship rituals, that convey vital information about species identity, mate quality, and receptiveness of prospective mates, thereby enhancing reproductive success. These signals are especially critical in social species where a single female founds a colony following a single event of mating. In this study, we investigate the short-range signals produced by gynes (newly emerged queens) and their role in mating in Bombus impatiens. Mating in bumblebees is facilitated by males marking mating sites with long-range labial gland pheromones, which attract gynes. It is assumed that gynes produce short-range signals necessary to initiate mating. While male bumblebee sex pheromones have been extensively studied across many species, the short-range signals produced by gynes remain poorly understood. Our findings show that males rely on multimodal signals, composed of visual, context-dependent sex pheromones, and likely also vibrational signals produced by gynes. Choice bioassays designed to isolate the different signals produced by gynes indicate that visual cues are essential but not sufficient for successful mating, and compounds from the labial and dufour glands likely play a role in attracting males. Our results also highlight the possible importance of vibrational signals for male attraction. Together, these findings underscore the role of gynes in regulating mating and the significance of context in eliciting male responses and mate selection through various signals.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Sublethal pesticide exposure decreases mating and disrupts chemical signaling in a beneficial pollinator

  The Science of The Total Environment · 2025-03-01 · 9 citations

  articleSenior author
  PublisherDOI

• A social bee can learn a novel queen pheromone

  bioRxiv (Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory) · 2025-06-02 · 1 citations

  preprintOpen access1st authorCorresponding

  Abstract Many pheromone responses are hardwired into the insect’s nervous system and are essential for critical behaviors such as mating, alarm signaling, and trail following. Workers of social species are also assumed to respond innately to queen pheromones, leading to changes in behavior and reproductive physiology. However, accumulating evidence highlights the potential roles of learning and experience in responses to pheromones regulating reproductive division of labor. To examine if the response to queen pheromone can be learned, we introduced bumblebee workers ( Bombus terrestris ) to a new queen pheromone by treating the queen daily with floral scents unfamiliar to the workers: either anisyl alcohol or methyl anthranilate. We allowed perfumed queens to establish colonies and examined worker attraction and egg laying following daily exposure to these odors without the queen, both with and without brood as context. Workers preferred the odor they grew up with and exposure to learned odors without the queen influenced worker egg laying only in the presence of brood, surprisingly resulting in increased egg laying. Our study demonstrates that workers can modify their behavior after learning an odor associated with their queen or nest. These learned odors function as context-dependent releaser pheromones, influencing worker attraction and egg-laying behavior.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Hormetic response to pesticides in diapausing bees

  Biology Letters · 2025-01-01 · 2 citations

  articleOpen access1st authorCorresponding

  Pollinators face declines and diversity loss associated with multiple stressors, particularly pesticides. Most pollination services are provided by annual bees that undergo winter diapause, and many common pesticides are highly soluble in water and move through soil and plants where bees hibernate and feed, yet the effects of pesticides on pollinators' diapause survival and performance are poorly understood. Pesticides may have complex effects in bees, and some were shown to induce hormetic effects on various traits characterized by high-dose inhibition coupled with low-dose stimulation. Here, we examined the occurrence of hormesis in the responses of bees to imidacloprid. We found that while longevity and reproduction were reduced following exposure to imidacloprid, the survival length of new queens (gynes) was greater. Diapause is a critical period in the life cycle of most bees with profound effects on their health. Exposure to sublethal doses of pesticides may increase bees' resistance to stress/cold during diapause but may also trade off with reduced reproductive performance later in life. Identifying these trade-offs is crucial to understanding how stressors affect pollinator health and should be accounted for when assessing pesticide risk, designing studies and facilitating conservation and management tools for supporting annual bees during diapause.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Male attraction to short-range multimodal gyne signals in bumble bees

  bioRxiv (Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory) · 2025-06-15

  preprintSenior authorCorresponding

  ABSTRACT Mating is a crucial event in animal life, with significant implications for individual fitness. Insects have evolved complex mating systems and behaviors, such as pheromone signaling and elaborate courtship rituals, that convey vital information about mates’ species, quality, and receptiveness, to optimize reproductive success. These signals are especially critical in social species where a single female found a colony following a single event of mating. In this study, we investigate the short-range signals produced by gynes (newly emerged queens) and their role in mating in Bombus impatiens . Mating in bumble bees is facilitated by males marking mating sites with long-range labial gland pheromones, which attract gynes. It is assumed that gynes produce short-range signals necessary to initiate mating. While male bumble bee sex pheromones have been extensively studied across many species, the short-range signals produced by gynes remain poorly understood. Our findings show that males rely on multimodal signals, composed of visual, vibrational, and context-dependent sex pheromones produced by gynes. Choice bioassays designed to isolate the different signals produced by gynes indicate that visual cues are essential but not sufficient for successful mating, and compounds from the labial and dufour glands likely play a role in attracting males. Our results also highlight the importance of vibrational signals for male attraction. Together, these findings underscore the role of gynes in regulating mating and the significance of context in eliciting male responses and mate selection through various signals.

  PublisherDOI

• Author response for "Gyne production is regulated by the brood in a social bee ( <i>Bombus impatiens</i> )"

  2025-05-01

  peer-review1st authorCorresponding
  PublisherDOI

• Gyne production is regulated by the brood in a social bee ( <i>Bombus impatiens</i> )

  Royal Society Open Science · 2025-08-01 · 2 citations

  articleOpen access1st authorCorresponding

  Sexual production in social insects marks the peak of colony development, yet the mechanisms regulating it remain unclear. We investigated the role of brood in colony development, worker reproduction and sexual production in Bombus impatiens . While larvae are known to reduce worker egg laying and enhance the queen’s reproductive inhibition, these effects were previously tested only in small groups. We manipulated brood size in full-sized, young colonies by doubling or removing brood and monitored development. Colonies with doubled brood produced significantly more gynes, independent of the number of workers, while reduced-brood colonies exhibited a non-significant increase in male production that was driven by colony size. Worker ovary activation was lower in double-brood colonies, with no change in aggression. A follow-up experiment directly testing the effect of colony size showed that higher worker density led to higher ovary activation in workers but did not affect sexual production. These results suggest that brood strongly influences colony development and sexual production, possibly reflecting an extended phenotype of the queen, whereas worker ovary activation appears to be a more flexible process influenced by either brood presence or colony size. Understanding brood dynamics may be key to understanding the evolution of female castes in social insects.

  PublisherDOI

Recent grants

• CAREER: Sterility inducing mechanisms in social insects

  NSF · $1.0M · 2020–2027

Frequent coauthors

• Abraham Hefetz

  Tel Aviv University

  18 shared

• Margarita Orlova

  Pennsylvania State University

  16 shared

• Erin Treanore

  11 shared

• Christina M. Grozinger

  Pennsylvania State University

  10 shared

• Nathan Derstine

  Pennsylvania State University

  9 shared

• Jesse Starkey

  Texas A&M University

  9 shared

• David A. Galbraith

  Pennsylvania State University

  7 shared

• Gabriel Villar

  Instituto de Ciencias Tecnológicas

  6 shared

Labs

• Etya Amsalem's LabPI