Story highlights A new study suggests aluminum may be causing dementia in bees

The beehive population has dropped from 5 million to 2.5 million since the 1940s

(CNN) From pesticides to possible cell phone radiation, the causes of bee population decline are an ongoing debate.

Now there's another thing the buzzy little insect has to fear, dementia.

A new study , published on PLOS ONE, says aluminum, "one of the most significant environmental contaminant of recent times," could be responsible for the pollinators' decline.

Bees typically do not avoid aluminum, which can be found in nectar, so that led researchers to collect pupae samples from colonies of naturally foraging bees that were then tested for aluminum content. The study led by Keele University's Chris Exley and Ellen Rotheray and Dave Goulson of the University of Sussex found the pupae were heavily contaminated with aluminum.

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