What the Bees See by Craig P. Burrows

Author:Craig P. Burrows
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Chronicle Books LLC

03./ The Pursuit of Immortality

The Pursuit of Immortality

Introduction Nick Worthington

In the natural world, death is a part of life. Life literally blossoms, then dies. The cycle of life for most plants continues only if they are lucky enough to have their pollinated seeds spread far and wide.

Beyond reproduction, few life forms have found a way to live forever. One exception is the ‘Immortal Jellyfish’, Turritopsis dohrnii. This small biologically immortal jellyfish has developed the ability to reverse the aging process by reverting from adult to juvenile and repeating its life cycle at will.

In the world of the honeybee, royal jelly plays an important role in determining which eggs will become queen bees. While all new larvae are fed royal jelly initially, most are weaned off this powerful product after three days and fed other hive foods such as bee bread. When the hive needs to produce or replace a queen bee, it continues feeding royal jelly to a select few larvae. These special pupae eventually emerge as fully grown queens, where they will fight it out to the death — because there can only be one queen. The reigning queen’s lifespan is remarkable: living on a diet of royal jelly alone, she lives around forty times longer than the average bee.

In human terms that equates to roughly 3,000 years, which would mean you or I could have been born before Jesus — and still be alive today.

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