Researchers have found that honeybees can produce as much atmospheric electric charge as a storm cloud. This type of electricity helps shape weather events, helps insects find food, and helps spiders migrate. The research shows that living things can have an impact on the atmosphere.
"We always looked at how physics influenced biology, but at some point, we realized that biology might also be influencing physics." We are interested in how organisms use the static electric fields in the environment.
Bee's carry an electric charge. The team developed a model that can predict the influence of other insects after finding that honeybee hive swarms change the atmospheric electricity by 100 to 1,000 volts per meter.
Liam O'Reilly is a Biologist at the University of Bristol. The influence of Locusts on atmospheric electricity is much greater than that of honeybees.
There are many unsuspected links that can exist over different spatial scales, ranging from microbes in the soil to insect swarms and perhaps the global electric circuit.
Giles Harrison is an atmospheric physicist from the University of Reading.
More information: Liam J. O'Reilly, Observed electric charge of insect swarms and their contribution to atmospheric electricity, iScience (2022). DOI: 10.1016/j.isci.2022.105241. www.cell.com/iscience/fulltext … 2589-0042(22)01513-9 Journal information: iScience
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