Commercializing the pollen industry may be great for business, but it’s bad news for the bumblebees according to Binghamton University Professor of Biological Sciences Nancy Stamp. Bumblebees are used in greenhouses to pollinate fresh-market tomatoes. Stamp argues that bee diseases and infection spread from these commercialized colonies. The impact on bumblebees is notably tragic, as they work harder and at cooler temperatures than honeybees making their participation in the pollination cycle essential.

Supporting local bumblebee habitats and conservation can help save these insects, said Stamp.

“It’s not too late to help native bumblebees,” she said. About the researcher: Stamp's research interests include community ecology and science education. Her current work is focused on plant defense theory (why some plants are well-defended and others are not) and the challenges of testing hypotheses about plant defense. Within that context, her research has also addressed the set of factors that determine how well insect predators do in different situations, in particular temperature (or climate) changes, when prey contain plant-defensive chemicals and when prey are scarce.

Website: http://www2.binghamton.edu/biology/faculty/stamp.html

Binghamton University:Binghamton University is one of the four university centers of the State University of New York. Known for the excellence of its students, faculty, staff and programs, Binghamton enrolls close to 15,000 students in programs leading to bachelor's, master's and doctoral degrees. Its curriculum, founded in the liberal arts, has expanded to include selected professional and graduate programs.