Engineered honeybee gut bacteria trick attackers into self-destructing

Special microbes mount steady gene-silencing attacks on mites or viruses

honeybees

A test of genetic sabotage offers new hope for fighting one of the biggest dangers to honeybee health, the small, disease-spreading, fat-sucking Varroa mite (seen clamped on the side of the nearest bee).  

Heather Broccard-Bell/iStock/Getty Images Plus

Deadly, fat-sucking mites and wing-wrecking viruses, take note.