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Neonicotinoid pesticide exposure impairs crop pollination services provided by bumblebees

Overview of attention for article published in Nature, November 2015
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About this Attention Score

  • In the top 5% of all research outputs scored by Altmetric
  • High Attention Score compared to outputs of the same age (99th percentile)
  • High Attention Score compared to outputs of the same age and source (91st percentile)

Mentioned by

news
26 news outlets
blogs
12 blogs
policy
2 policy sources
twitter
270 X users
patent
1 patent
facebook
8 Facebook pages
wikipedia
1 Wikipedia page
googleplus
4 Google+ users
video
2 YouTube creators

Citations

dimensions_citation
245 Dimensions

Readers on

mendeley
514 Mendeley
citeulike
4 CiteULike
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Title
Neonicotinoid pesticide exposure impairs crop pollination services provided by bumblebees
Published in
Nature, November 2015
DOI 10.1038/nature16167
Pubmed ID
Authors

Dara A. Stanley, Michael P. D. Garratt, Jennifer B. Wickens, Victoria J. Wickens, Simon G. Potts, Nigel E. Raine

Abstract

Recent concern over global pollinator declines has led to considerable research on the effects of pesticides on bees. Although pesticides are typically not encountered at lethal levels in the field, there is growing evidence indicating that exposure to field-realistic levels can have sublethal effects on bees, affecting their foraging behaviour, homing ability and reproductive success. Bees are essential for the pollination of a wide variety of crops and the majority of wild flowering plants, but until now research on pesticide effects has been limited to direct effects on bees themselves and not on the pollination services they provide. Here we show the first evidence to our knowledge that pesticide exposure can reduce the pollination services bumblebees deliver to apples, a crop of global economic importance. Bumblebee colonies exposed to a neonicotinoid pesticide provided lower visitation rates to apple trees and collected pollen less often. Most importantly, these pesticide-exposed colonies produced apples containing fewer seeds, demonstrating a reduced delivery of pollination services. Our results also indicate that reduced pollination service delivery is not due to pesticide-induced changes in individual bee behaviour, but most likely due to effects at the colony level. These findings show that pesticide exposure can impair the ability of bees to provide pollination services, with important implications for both the sustained delivery of stable crop yields and the functioning of natural ecosystems.

X Demographics

X Demographics

The data shown below were collected from the profiles of 270 X users who shared this research output. Click here to find out more about how the information was compiled.
Mendeley readers

Mendeley readers

The data shown below were compiled from readership statistics for 514 Mendeley readers of this research output. Click here to see the associated Mendeley record.

Geographical breakdown

Country Count As %
United States 3 <1%
United Kingdom 3 <1%
Canada 2 <1%
Colombia 1 <1%
Italy 1 <1%
France 1 <1%
Norway 1 <1%
Romania 1 <1%
Sri Lanka 1 <1%
Other 2 <1%
Unknown 498 97%

Demographic breakdown

Readers by professional status Count As %
Student > Ph. D. Student 101 20%
Researcher 81 16%
Student > Bachelor 68 13%
Student > Master 65 13%
Other 22 4%
Other 78 15%
Unknown 99 19%
Readers by discipline Count As %
Agricultural and Biological Sciences 241 47%
Environmental Science 78 15%
Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology 23 4%
Chemistry 8 2%
Medicine and Dentistry 4 <1%
Other 36 7%
Unknown 124 24%
Attention Score in Context

Attention Score in Context

This research output has an Altmetric Attention Score of 465. This is our high-level measure of the quality and quantity of online attention that it has received. This Attention Score, as well as the ranking and number of research outputs shown below, was calculated when the research output was last mentioned on 28 November 2023.
All research outputs
#58,807
of 25,517,918 outputs
Outputs from Nature
#4,685
of 98,129 outputs
Outputs of similar age
#741
of 393,292 outputs
Outputs of similar age from Nature
#90
of 1,060 outputs
Altmetric has tracked 25,517,918 research outputs across all sources so far. Compared to these this one has done particularly well and is in the 99th percentile: it's in the top 5% of all research outputs ever tracked by Altmetric.
So far Altmetric has tracked 98,129 research outputs from this source. They typically receive a lot more attention than average, with a mean Attention Score of 102.6. This one has done particularly well, scoring higher than 95% of its peers.
Older research outputs will score higher simply because they've had more time to accumulate mentions. To account for age we can compare this Altmetric Attention Score to the 393,292 tracked outputs that were published within six weeks on either side of this one in any source. This one has done particularly well, scoring higher than 99% of its contemporaries.
We're also able to compare this research output to 1,060 others from the same source and published within six weeks on either side of this one. This one has done particularly well, scoring higher than 91% of its contemporaries.