Rationale

Scientific knowledge published in languages other than English can be difficult to discover and is therefore easily overlooked in international research and evidence synthesis. This is particularly relevant to insect science, where research is closely tied to regional agricultural practices, locally important species and industries, and practitioner communities. The joint Insect-IMP WG7/WG8 workshop in İzmir, Türkiye, in April 2026 therefore explored what research on insect genetics and selective breeding exists across languages, how visible this literature is through commonly used search systems, and how it could be better connected to the wider scientific community.

During the workshop, participants worked in language groups to identify relevant databases, develop native-language search terms, explore the literature for selected insect species, and discuss how research across languages could be compared and communicated. The exercise currently covers 15 languages (Croatian, Czech, English, French, German, Greek, Hungarian, Italian, Portuguese, Romanian, Russian, Slovenian, Spanish, Turkish and Ukrainian) and focuses on four species: Bombyx mori (silkworm), Dactylopius coccus (cochineal insect), Hermetia illucens (black soldier fly) and Tenebrio molitor (yellow mealworm). These species were chosen to represent both traditionally farmed insects, for which more knowledge is likely to exist in non-English literature, and “novel” insects farmed for food and feed.

Methodology

Preliminary survey

A preliminary Google Scholar survey of five insect species identified ~111,000 hits using the English-language interface and ~34,000 hits across 11 other language interfaces over the past decade (Table 1). Because bilingual abstracts are likely to inflate the English counts, these figures are only indicative, but they suggested a substantial body of non-English literature and motivated further exploration during the workshop.

Table 1: Preliminary Google Scholar survey – hits per species and language interface (past decade)

Language	Hermetia illucens	Tenebrio molitor	Acheta domesticus	Bombyx mori	Apis mellifera	Total
Chinese	396	516	39	2,110	1,240	4,301
Dutch	55	40	24	17	254	390
French	170	305	123	435	1,840	2,873
German	116	383	151	318	1,050	2,018
Italian	271	222	86	215	594	1,388
Japanese	46	57	30	483	238	854
Korean	101	380	19	233	431	1,164
Polish	42	102	50	111	346	651
Portuguese	415	1,210	172	952	6,190	8,939
Spanish	771	1,220	519	893	6,670	10,073
Turkish	76	185	56	250	1,230	1,797
Total (11 languages)	2,459	4,620	1,269	6,017	20,083	34,448
English	15,600	16,700	8,530	32,400	37,900	111,130
No language filter	16,200	17,300	10,500	31,300	42,200	117,500

Keywords and search

We then quantified the amount of non-English literature with a unified Google Scholar search. The search combined standardised keywords for six core concepts relevant to insect breeding and genetics – breeding, genotyping, mating, phenotyping, reproduction and selection – with the scientific name of each focal species. The keywords were agreed in advance and translated into the participants’ native languages (Table 2), providing a multilingual search vocabulary for genetics and selective-breeding concepts, together with local species names. These are intended as literature-search terms rather than definitive translations, and we welcome corrections, alternatives, and additional terms or languages.

Participants also identified national and regional databases that hold non-English literature, particularly theses (Table 3). Searches were run for each focal species and language across four ten-year periods (1987–2026), revealing literature trends over the last 40 years (Table 4).

Table 2a: Search terms for the six core concepts

Language	Breeding	Selection	Mating	Reproduction	Phenotyping	Genotyping
English	breeding	selection	mating	reproduction	phenotyping	genotyping
Croatian	uzgoj	selekcija	parenje	razmnožavanje / reprodukcija	fenotipizacija	genotipizacija
Czech	šlechtění / chov	selekce	páření	rozmnožování / reprodukce	fenotypizace	genotypizace
French	élevage	sélection	accouplement	reproduction	phénotypage	génotypage
German	Zucht / Züchtung / Zuchtwahl	Selektion	Paarung	Reproduktion	Phänotypisierung	Genotypisierung
Greek	γενετική βελτίωση	επιλογή	σύζευξη	αναπαραγωγή	φαινοτύπηση	γονοτύπηση
Hungarian	tenyésztés	szelekció	párosodás	szaporodás	fenotipizálás	genotipizálás
Italian	allevamento	selezione	accoppiamento	riproduzione	fenotipizzazione	genotipizzazione
Portuguese	melhoramento	seleção	acasalamento	reprodução	fenotipagem	genotipagem
Romanian	ameliorare	selecție	împerechere	reproducere	fenotipare	genotipare
Russian	разведение	селекция	спаривание	размножение	фенотипирование	генотипирование
Serbian	–	–	парење (parenje)	–	–	–
Slovenian	vzreja	selekcija	parjenje	razmnoževanje / reprodukcija	fenotipizacija	–
Spanish	cría	selección	apareamiento	reproducción	fenotipado	genotipado
Turkish	ıslah / yetiştirme / besleme / üretim	seçilim	çiftleşme	üreme	fenotipleme	genotipleme
Ukrainian	розведення	селекція	спарювання	розмноження	фенотипування	генотипування

Table 2b: Local names of the focal species

Language	Hermetia illucens	Tenebrio molitor	Dactylopius coccus	Bombyx mori
English	black soldier fly	yellow mealworm	cochineal	silkworm
Catalan	mosca soldat negra	–	–	–
Croatian	(crna) vojnička muha	(veliki) brašnar	košenilska uš	dudov svilac
Czech	bráněnka černá / bráněnka / moucha bráněnka	potemník moučný	červec nopálový	bourec morušový
French	mouche soldat noire	–	cochenille	–
Greek	μύγα μαύρος στρατιώτης	κίτρινος αλευροσκώληκας	κοχενίλλη	μεταξοσκώληκας
Italian	mosca soldato nera	–	–	–
Portuguese	mosca-soldado-negra	tenébrio / tenébrio comum / bicho-da-farinha / tenebrião	cochonilha-do-carmim / grana fina	bicho-da-seda
Romanian	musca soldat neagră	gândacul de făină	coșenilă	viermele de mătase
Russian	чёрная львинка	большой мучной хрущак / мучной хрущак	мексиканская кошениль / кошениль	тутовый шелкопряд
Serbian	црна војничка мува (crna vojnička muva)	брашнасти црв (brašnasti crv)	–	свилена буба (svilena buba) / свилени мољац (svileni moljac)
Slovenian	črna bojevniška muha	(rumeni) mokar	košeniljka	sviloprejka
Spanish	mosca soldado negra	–	grana cochinilla / cochinilla	–
Turkish	kara asker sineği / siyah asker sineği	un kurdu	koşnil / koşinil	ipek böceği
Ukrainian	львинка чорна	хрущак борошняний	червець	шовкопряд шовковичний

Table 3: National and regional databases

Language	Database	Content
Greek	National Archive of PhD Theses (NAPhD)	National archive of doctoral theses
Greek	Aristotle University of Thessaloniki (AUTh) Library	University library and repository
Greek	Democritus University of Thrace (DUTH) Repository	University repository
French	HAL open archive	French academic and grey literature, including INRAE and CEA papers
Portuguese	RCAAP portal	Open-access content aggregated from Portuguese institutional repositories
Portuguese	RCCPLP portal	Open-access content aggregated from Portuguese-speaking countries
Portuguese	ProQuest Dissertations & Theses Global	International theses database (subscription)
Serbian	DoiSerbia	Serbian scientific journals
Serbian	DoiSerbia PhD	Serbian doctoral theses
Slovenian	University of Ljubljana Repository (RUL)	University theses and publications
Slovenian	University of Maribor Digital Library (DKUM)	University theses and publications
Slovenian	University of Primorska Repository	University theses and publications
Turkish	Ulusal Tez Merkezi	National thesis archive
Turkish	TÜBİTAK ULAKBİM TR Dizin	Index of national journals

Table 4: Google Scholar records per species and language, 1987–2026

Language	Bombyx mori	Dactylopius coccus	Hermetia illucens	Tenebrio molitor	Total
Croatian	86	10	43	87	226
Czech	357	34	118	349	858
French	773	59	220	441	1,493
German	569	25	103	365	1,062
Greek	71	14	62	85	232
Hungarian	41	3	13	23	80
Italian	246	39	2	182	469
Portuguese	1,632	269	354	1,637	3,892
Romanian	23	3	5	13	44
Russian	376	8	206	224	814
Spanish	1,168	604	643	1,228	3,643
Turkish	351	90	87	264	792
Ukrainian	252	6	118	108	484
Non-English total	5,945	1,164	1,974	5,006	14,089
English	50,130	2,174	16,139	29,330	97,773

Results

The current work is exploratory and provides a snapshot of the field rather than an exhaustive bibliographic review. Nevertheless, several patterns point to directions for further investigation. First, non-English insect research appears to have expanded substantially in recent decades (Figure 1). Second, non-English insect research has almost always grown faster than the English-language literature (Figure 2). Third, species are not equally represented across languages (Figure 3). Finally, research attention to individual insect species has shifted over time (Figure 4).

Publication hub

Participants also collected individual publications encountered in the non-English literature. Some were drawn from the Google Scholar search above, while others were found through detective work in national databases, plain Google searches and other sources. Where titles, keywords or abstracts were available only in the original language, machine-translated English versions were added to make them easier to find and compare. The collection currently holds 229 records in 14 languages, ranging from nineteenth-century sericulture literature to papers published in 2026 (Table 5). Together, these resources form the core of the Insect-IMP Cross-Language Knowledge Hub.

Table 5: Cross-language literature collection – records by language

Language of publication	Records
Turkish	72
Italian	45
Greek	27
Spanish	27
Portuguese	20
German	10
English	6
French	6
Russian	6
Romanian	5
Slovenian	2
Czech	1
Serbian	1
Uzbek	1
Total	229

Observations from the language groups

National databases may reveal literature and patterns that are poorly represented in Google Scholar. The language-group screening showed that non-English insect science is not simply a smaller version of the English-language literature: its composition varies considerably among languages, countries, species, publication types and research traditions. In several language groups, potentially useful research was concentrated in MSc and PhD theses, whose full findings rarely make it into subsequent publications. Across several languages, theses therefore emerged as an especially important, but underused and hard-to-reach, source of data.

Strong historical patterns were also apparent. Greek, Slavic, Romanian and Portuguese-language searches highlighted a substantial legacy of research on Bombyx mori, reflecting established traditions of sericulture and selective breeding. Some Slavic sources on silkworm breeding date back to the nineteenth century, while Portuguese searches recovered older work on silkworm lines, races and genetics, including publications from the former Boletim de Sericultura. In contrast, recent literature increasingly features Hermetia illucens and Tenebrio molitor, particularly in connection with food, feed, nutrition, rearing and other emerging applications, pointing to shifting priorities. There were also striking geographical and linguistic differences among species. Spanish-language literature was particularly important for Dactylopius coccus, an insect with a long history of cultivation in Latin America, although comparatively little of the material identified concerned genetics.

The screening also highlighted how scientific knowledge circulates between languages. Turkish-language searches, for example, returned many review articles, suggesting that native-language publications may play a role in synthesising internationally available knowledge for local audiences, while original research was often found in theses or published internationally in English. Our observations also suggest that searching across languages can recover additional publications – sometimes replications – which add depth to the available knowledge even where they overlap with, rather than complement, the existing English literature.

These patterns are exploratory observations from the language-group screening, not the results of a systematic comparison of publication types or research themes across languages. The counts should also be interpreted as search visibility rather than absolute publication numbers: records can overlap across species, and multilingual metadata can cause a publication to appear in more than one language search. This was already evident in the preliminary survey, where the Google Scholar results could not be treated as mutually exclusive sets of publications in separate languages.

We believe the Insect-IMP Cross-Language Knowledge Hub provides a foundation for a more systematic assessment of insect science across languages.