THE CALIFORNIA AGGIE - Project Apis m. reported massive colony loss in early 2025, estimating around 1.6 million colonies lost in a report from April — a large number considering the National Agricultural Statistics Service (NASS) estimated the total number of United States colonies is 2.7 million. While there have been continuous losses of 30 to 50% in previous years — such as a colony collapse disorder first noted in 2006 — the recent losses have been especially drastic, drawing concern regarding food security, among other things.
While research to identify the cause of this most recent colony loss is ongoing, past research shows that bee decline is often driven by pests, pathogens, pesticides and poor nutrition.
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In a paper published in early 2025 in the Association for Computing Machinery Transactions on Knowledge Discovery from Data journal, a team developed a system utilizing low-cost sensors to predict problems in the hive.
The team included Shamima Hossain, a Ph.D. candidate in the Electrical and Computer Engineering Department at UC Riverside, Dr. Christos Faloutsos, a professor in the Computer Science Department at Carnegie Mellon University, Dr. Boris Baer, a professor of entomology at UC Riverside, Dr. Hyoseung Kim, an associate professor in the Electrical and Computer Engineering Department and the chair of the computer engineering program at UC Riverside, and Dr. Vassilis Tsotras, a professor in the Electrical and Computer Engineering Department at UC Riverside, discussed their system and their decision to focus on temperature.