Honeybee Swarms Can Produce as Much Electric Charge as a Storm Cloud

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https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/honeybee-swarms-can-produce-as-much-electric-charge-as-a-thunderstorm-180981005/

Honeybee Swarms Can Produce as Much Electric Charge as a Storm Cloud

Denser swarms create more atmospheric electricity, new research suggests

Sarah Kuta
Daily Correspondent
October 28, 2022

While Ellard Hunting and fellow researchers were out studying the weather at a field station in England, they noticed something unexpected on one of their instruments. Though there was no storm approaching, the scientists’ electric field monitors recorded a curious uptick in atmospheric electric charge.

Nearby, western honeybees that lived in on-site research hives were swarming as they attempted to find a new home. When the team took a closer look at their data, they discovered that the swarming honeybees had created an atmospheric electric charge—and that their charge was similar to that of a thunderstorm cloud. The researchers shared more details about their findings this week in the journal iScience.

“This makes it the first report of biology as a source of biogenic space charge, which can be as relevant as physical phenomena such as clouds,” says Hunting, one of the study's authors and a biophysicist at the University of Bristol in England, to Popular Science’s Laura Baisas.

Scientists had known that individual bees carry a small charge while flying through the air, caused by the friction of their body parts against the air and each other. It’s similar to how rubbing a balloon on a piece of fabric or shuffling sock-clad feet across a rug creates static electricity. Scientists believe a bee’s charge helps pollen stick to it and signals to other bees which flowers have already been visited.

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https://www.cell.com/iscience/fulltext/S2589-0042(22)01513-9

Observed electric charge of insect swarms and their contribution to atmospheric electricity

Ellard R. Hunting 3, 4
Liam J. O’Reilly 3
R. Giles Harrison
Sam J. England
Beth H. Harris
Daniel Robert

Published:October 24, 2022
DOI:https://doi.org/10.1016/j.isci.2022.105241


Highlights

• Aerial insects carry an electric charge

• Swarming honeybees have a density-dependent effect on atmospheric electricity

• Insects can have similar effects on atmospheric electricity as weather events

Summary
The atmosphere hosts multiple sources of electric charge that influence critical processes such as the aggregation of droplets and the removal of dust and aerosols. This is evident in the variability of the atmospheric electric field. Whereas these electric fields are known to respond to physical and geological processes, the effect of biotic sources of charge has not hitherto been considered. Here, we combine theoretical and empirical evidence to demonstrate that honeybee swarms directly contribute to atmospheric electricity, in proportion to the swarm density. We provide a quantitative assessment of this finding, by comparing the electrical contribution of various swarming insect species with common abiotic sources of charge. This reveals that the charge contribution of some insect swarms will be comparable with that of meteorologically induced variations. The observed transport of charge by insects therefore demonstrates an unexplored role of biogenic space charge for physical and ecological processes in the atmosphere.

[BlueSky3]

1. Really interesting

Thanks!

[Ponietz]

2. Trees also perform this feat

[https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/feart.2022.853584/full]