"The whole world loves honey," proclaims a bumper sticker in a Penn State entomology department display case. Since late 2006, when an alarming die-off of honeybees was first recognized in Pennsylvania and elsewhere in the U.S. -- a phenomenon termed Colony Collapse Disorder or CCD (see http://live.psu.edu/story/21979 online) -- several Penn State entomologists have been examining possible reasons for the problem. This summer press and documentary crews from around the world have come to University Park to interview the researchers about the possible causes of CCD.

Photo Credit: Jill Shockey / Penn State Public Information

Year Taken: 2007

Entomology Professor Diana Cox-Foster explains some of the science behind her honeybee research to a documentary film crew from Japan, who were on the Univesity Park campus in late August. Cox-Foster's research has become of great international interest, as has several of her colleagues in Penn State's entomology department, in the College of Agricultural Sciences.

Photo Credit: Jill Shockey / Penn State Public Information

Year Taken: 2007

Maryann Frazier, a senior Penn State Cooperative Extension associate and another key researcher of Colony Collapse Disorder, shows a Japanese documentary film crew's director and his crew's project coordinator frozen samples of honeybees used in Frazier's research as well as that of her husband, Professor Jim Frazier.

Photo Credit: Jill Shockey / Penn State Public Information

Year Taken: 2007

Penn State researcher Maryann Frazier holds a frozen sample of pulverized honeybees, which were collected from Penn State's apiary and other field locations to examine possible environmental factors that could be causing the bees to die in alarming numbers.

Photo Credit: Jill Shockey / Penn State Public Information

Year Taken: 2007

A videographer and sound technician from a Japanese documentary crew record Professor of Entomology Diana Cox-Foster as she goes about her research. Earlier in the summer, documentary crews from Germany and South Korea interviewed her and other Penn State researchers for similar video projects. In addition, the Sept. 3, 2007, issue of "Fortune" magazine contained a seven-page article, "Flight of the Honeybees," which quoted Cox-Foster and her Penn State entomology colleague Professor Chris Mullin, and earlier in 2007 "Dan Rather Reports" aired a segment titled "Where are the Bees?" that included Cox-Foster.

Photo Credit: Jill Shockey / Penn State Public Information

Year Taken: 2007

A documentary film director from Japan donned a bee T-shirt that he had made in downtown State College prior to his team's shoot in Professor Diana Cox-Foster's laboratory, in the Agricultural Sciences & Industries Building on the University Park campus.

Photo Credit: Jill Shockey / Penn State Public Information

Year Taken: 2007

Owen Thompson, a graduate researcher in Professor Diana Cox-Foster's laboratory, is filmed by the Japanese documentary crew. The two-part documentary is scheduled to air in Japan on two Sundays in October.

Photo Credit: Jill Shockey / Penn State Public Information

Year Taken: 2007

Entomology Professor Diana Cox-Foster is interviewed by a Japanese reporter for a two-part documentary to air in Japan in October. Cox-Foster is one of several Penn State entomology researchers who are looking into the possible causes of Colony Collapse Disorder, a mysterious and widespread disappearance of honeybees in the United States that is spreading around the world.

Photo Credit: Jill Shockey / Penn State Public Information

Year Taken: 2007