Reprinted from The Journal of Comparative Neurology, Vol. 27, No. 1 

 December, 1916 



NUCLEAR SIZE IN THE NERVE CELLS OF THE BEE 

 DURING THE LIFE CYCLE 



W. M. SMALLWOOD and RUTH L. PHILLIPS 

 {From the Zoological Laboratory of Syracuse University, C. W. Hargitt, Director.) 



ONE PIGUBE 



The following study of nuclear size in the nerve cells of the 

 antennal lobe of the bee was undertaken for the purpose of 

 learning what are the normal conditions and what, if any, changes 

 they undergo during the life cycle. 



Bees afford exceptionally good material for such work because 

 all members of a given swarm are of identical parentage; all 

 spend an iaactive larval existence, and the life cycle of individu- 

 als varies according to type and season. Drones hve through 

 the summer, queens may live for seven years, and the workers, 

 with which we are concerned in this paper, have a hfe cycle 

 varying from about six weeks in the summer to about six months 

 for the insects hatched from an autumn brood. 



Hodge^ ('92) published his observations on daily fatigue in the 

 bee, the sparrow and the cat. In this work he chose the cells 

 of the antennal lobes because they are easily located. We have 

 limited our study to the cells of this region for the same reason. 

 It is usually considered that excessive stimuh in the form of an 

 immense amount of normal daily work, electrical stimulation, or 

 surgical shock result in a decrease of nuclear size among the 

 nerve cells. That such assxunptions are commonly held, the 

 work of Crile^ and Hodge shows. 



Conklin' ('12) has shown that there is a normal relation be- 

 tween the size of a cell and its nucleus, and Kocher* ('16) has 



» Journal of Morphology, vol. 7, 1892, p. 153. 



* Journal of the American Medical Association, vol. 57, no. 23, 1911, p. 1812. 

 ' Journal of Experimental Zoology, vol. 12, 1912, p. 1. 



* Journal of Comparative Neurology, vol. 26, no. 3, 1916. 



