Ultrastructural Organization of the Honeybee Blood-Brain Barrier and Comparison with Age
The blood-brain barrier is a near ubiquitous feature of animal nervous systems, adapted to maintain brain homeostasis across species occupying unique and dynamic environments. Understanding the structural and functional diversity of animal blood-brain barriers can aid our understanding of how this structure contributes to important areas of neuroscience such as behavior, health, and disease. The honeybee worker is a well-established model for exploring these dimensions of brain function, however, the honeybee worker blood-brain barrier has yet to be described. Here, we present the first global anatomic analysis and description of the honeybee worker blood-brain barrier and compare key ultrastructural features between two age groups. We describe the cellular makeup of the honeybee worker blood-brain barrier, patterns of heterogeneity in barrier structure throughout the brain, and highlight important areas of further study.