About the Authors

Ivan Meeus

ivan.meeus@ugent.be (IM); guy.smagghe@UGent.be (GS)

Affiliation Laboratory of Agrozoology, Department of Crop Protection, Faculty of Bioscience Engineering, Ghent University, Coupure Links 653, B-9000, Ghent, Belgium

Laurian Parmentier

Affiliation Laboratory of Agrozoology, Department of Crop Protection, Faculty of Bioscience Engineering, Ghent University, Coupure Links 653, B-9000, Ghent, Belgium

Annelies Billiet

Affiliation Laboratory of Agrozoology, Department of Crop Protection, Faculty of Bioscience Engineering, Ghent University, Coupure Links 653, B-9000, Ghent, Belgium

Kevin Maebe

Affiliation Laboratory of Agrozoology, Department of Crop Protection, Faculty of Bioscience Engineering, Ghent University, Coupure Links 653, B-9000, Ghent, Belgium

Filip Van Nieuwerburgh

Affiliation Laboratory of Pharmaceutical Biotechnology, Faculty of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Ghent University, Ottergemsesteenweg 460, B-9000, Ghent, Belgium

Dieter Deforce

Affiliation Laboratory of Pharmaceutical Biotechnology, Faculty of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Ghent University, Ottergemsesteenweg 460, B-9000, Ghent, Belgium

Felix Wäckers

Affiliation Biobest NV, Ilse Velden 18, B-2260, Westerlo, Belgium

Peter Vandamme

Affiliation Laboratory of Microbiology, Department of Biochemistry and Microbiology, Faculty of Sciences, Ghent University, K. L. Ledeganckstraat 3, B-9000, Ghent, Belgium

Guy Smagghe

ivan.meeus@ugent.be (IM); guy.smagghe@UGent.be (GS)

Affiliation Laboratory of Agrozoology, Department of Crop Protection, Faculty of Bioscience Engineering, Ghent University, Coupure Links 653, B-9000, Ghent, Belgium

Competing Interests

One of the authors, FW, professor at the Lancaster University, has an additional affiliation as head of research of the bumblebee rearing company Biobest NV. However, this does not generate a conflict of interest and does not alter the authors' adherence to PLOS ONE policies on sharing data and materials. There are no other competing interests.

Author Contributions

Conceived and designed the experiments: IM GS. Performed the experiments: LP AB. Analyzed the data: IM KM LP. Contributed reagents/materials/analysis tools: FW FVN. Wrote the paper: IM PV LP AB KM FVN DD FW GS. Enabled Illumina sequencing and barcoding setup: FVN DD. Sampling: LP IM.