Insights into the venom peptide and protein composition of different honey bee species from bioinformatics studies

Honey bee venom contains several active molecules such as peptides and enzymes that have advantageous potential in treating inflammation and other diseases. This study aimed to investigate venom peptides and protein belonging to different species of honey bees by bioinformatics. The study looked at physicochemical, toxicity, antibacterial activity, and evolutionary properties. The bioinformatics analysis of honey bee venom peptides and proteins has been studied using ProtParam, ToxinPred, Antibp۲, and phylogeny.fr software. In silico results demonstrated that venom peptides and proteins belonging to different species of honey bee have different characteristics and melittin peptides belonging to Apis florea have the highest antibacterial activity. Of all the peptides examined, only ۳ were identified toxic by program. Evolutionary trees were drawn for the two proteins phospholipase A۲ and acid phosphatase and melittin peptide, because the rest of the proteins and peptides showed similar physicochemical properties among different species. Also, the results of physicochemical studies and evolutionary relationships were consistent. According to the results, there is a high biological and genetic diversity of honey bee venom, which can be useful depending on the purpose of the researcher.

Keywords:

Honey bee species , Venom peptides and proteins , Bioinformatics , Biodiversity.