The horizontal magnetic dance of the honeybee is compatible with a single-domain ferromagnetic magnetoreceptor

Abstract

Although honeybees are able to sense the geomagnetic field, very little is known about the method in which they are able to detect it. The recent discovery of biochemically precipitated magnetite (Fe 3O 4) in bees, however, suggests the possibility that they might use a simple compass organelle for magnetoreception. If so, their orientation accuracy ought to be related to the accuracy of the compass, e.g. it should be poor in weak background fields and enhanced in strong fields. When dancing to the magnetic directions on a horizontal honeycomb, bees clearly show this type of alignment behavior. A least-squares fit between the expected alignment of a compass and this horizontal dance data is consistent with this hypothesis, and implies that the receptors have magnetic moments of 5 × 10 −13 emu, or magnetite volumes near 10 −15 cm 3. Additional considerations suggests that these crystals are slightly sub-spherical and single-domain in size, held symmetrically in their receptors, and have a magnetic orientation energy of approximately to 6 kT in the geomagneticfield. A model of a magnetite-based magnetoreceptor consistent with these constraints is discussed.