Preventative medicine? Examining prophylactic effects of a sunflower pollen diet in Bombus impatiens

The widespread decline of pollinator populations is of concern for both natural and agricultural ecosystems. Pathogens have been identified as a major contributor to the decline of some bee species, making understanding host-pathogen dynamics a crucial area of research. Sunflower pollen (Helianthus annuus) dramatically and consistently reduces infection by a prevalent gut pathogen, Crithidia bombi, in the common eastern bumble bee (Bombus impatiens), when consumed by bees post-infection, but we do not know if sunflower can confer protection when consumed before exposure. We asked whether feeding bumble bees sunflower pollen diets before pathogen exposure decreases Crithidia infection compared to buckwheat pollen (Fagopyrum esculentum). Buckwheat pollen was used as a comparison since it has a similar protein concentration as sunflower pollen, but results in high Crithidia counts when consumed post-infection. Bumble bees were fed sunflower or buckwheat pollen for seven days, inoculated wi..., These data are from an experimental manipulative study performed in a lab setting to ask whether exposure to specific diets provides prophylactic protection against infection by a gut pathogen. Commercial bumble bees (Bombus impatiens) were assigned to be fed sunflower (Helianthus annuus) or buckwheat (Fagopyrum esculentum) pollen for one week and were then inoculated with a standard dose of Crithidia bombi, a gut pathogen. After inoculation, all bees were fed a standard wildflower pollen diet for one more week and then assessed to determine infection intensity (C. bombi cells per 0.02 uL)., , # Preventative medicine? Examining prophylactic effects of a sunflower pollen diet in *Bombus impatiens*

[https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.kwh70rzcm](https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.kwh70rzcm)

This file describes the archived R script and CSV files associated with this manuscript.

## Code/Software: R script: ProphylacticScript-CL\_Final.R

All the analyses and graphs in the manuscript are produced by this R script, which includes a \"set working directory\" command within the code for each question, which you will need to modify.

The script is written so that it works if all CSV data files are put into one folder, and the working directory is set to that folder. This has only been tested under Windows but should also be true in macOS and Linux.

## Description of the data and file structure

These CSV files were extracted from original data files in XLS or XLSX format. Missing data are indicated with 'NA'.

The CSV files are included in the archive so that the R script will run \"out of the...