Newcastle University

Qualifications

DPhil Zoology Oxford
MAS Statistics Ohio State
BSc(Hons) Botany Wyoming

Research Interests

The main aim of my research is to understand how the neural circuits involved in learning, memory, and decision-making function. I use the honeybee as a model system. To achieve this, I combine behavioural, pharmacological, molecular and electrophysiological techniques to address the following questions:

1. What are the neural mechanisms of food reward learning and conditioned food aversions?

2. How does physiological state influence learning, memory, and cognition?

3. How is sensory information about odours and tastes encoded?

A primary goal of my laboratory is to understand how the honeybee's brain learns to associate floral scent with food quality during learning.

My laboratory also investigates bee nutrition. As part of the UK government's Insect Pollinators Initiative, we are identifying the nutritional optima of honeybee workers and larvae and measuring the nutritional quality of nectar and pollen from many species of plants in the UK.

In the photograph, I'm wearing a 'bee bikini' composed of live worker honeybees. I wore the bee bikini at an event organized by bee breeder, Susan Cobey, at the Rothenbuhler Honeybee Lab, Ohio State University.

Esteem Indicators

Editorial Board Member: Animal Behaviour, European Journal of Entomology

Undergraduate Teaching 

BIO1010 Learning and Research for Biologists 

BIO2013 Animal Behaviour

BIO3006 Plant-Animal Interactions

BIO3022 Residential Field Course (Millport and Crete) 

BIO3096 Undergraduate Research Projects 

Postgraduate Teaching

MMB8019 Sensory Systems

MMB8099 Masters Research Project (Animal Behaviour and Neuroscience) 

• Mustard JA, Dews L, Brugatoa A, Dey K, Wright GA. Consumption of an acute dose of caffeine reduces acquisition but not memory in the honey bee. Behavioral Brain Research 2012, 232(1), 217-224.
• Choudhary AF, Laycock I, Wright GA. γ-Aminobutyric acid receptor A-mediated inhibition in the honeybee’s antennal lobe is necessary for the formation of configural olfactory percepts. European Journal of Neuroscience 2012, 35(11), 1718-1724.
• Wright GA, Lillvis JL, Bray HJ, Mustard JA. Physiological State Influences the Social Interactions of Two Honeybee Nest Mates. PLoS One 2012, 7(3), e32677.
• Wright GA. Appetitive Learning: Memories Need Calories. Current Biology 2011, 21(9), R301-R302.
• Bateson M, Desire S, Gartside SE, Wright GA. Agitated honeybees exhibit pessimistic cognitive biases. Current Biology 2011, 21(12), 1070-1073.
• Wright GA, Mustard JA, Simcock NK, Ross-Taylor AAR, McNicholas LD, Popescu A, Marion-Poll F. Parallel Reinforcement Pathways for Conditioned Food Aversions in the Honeybee. Current Biology 2010, 20(24), 2234–2240.
• Wright GA, Schiestl FP. The evolution of floral scent: the influence of olfactory learning by insect pollinators on the honest signaling of floral rewards. Functional Ecology 2009, 23(5), 841-851.
• Wright GA, Carlton M, Smith BH. A Honeybee's Ability to Learn, Recognize, and Discriminate Odors Depends Upon Odor Sampling Time and Concentration. Behavioral Neuroscience 2009, 123(1), 36-43.
• Wright GA. Bee Pheromones: Signal or Agent of Manipulation?. Current Biology 2009, 19(14), R547-R548.
• Wright GA, Choudhary AF, Bentley MA. Reward quality influences the development of learned olfactory biases in honeybees. Proceedings of the Royal Society B 2009, 276(1667), 2597-2604.
• Mustard JA, Edgar EA, Mazade RE, Wu C, Lillvis JL, Wright GA. Acute ethanol ingestion impairs appetitive olfactory learning and odor discrimination in the honeybee. Neurobiology of Learning and Memory 2008, 90(4), 633-643.
• Wright GA, Kottcamp SM, Thomson MGA. Generalization Mediates Sensitivity to Complex Odor Features in the Honeybee. PLoS ONE 2008, 3(2), e1704.