All articles tagged with #parasitology
A team led by Vamsi Mootha has mapped mitochondrial proteins across six eukaryotic organisms, identifying 33 protein families unique to pathogens and absent in humans. Published in nine papers, this atlas offers new drug targets for diseases like malaria and sleeping sickness while challenging current theories on mitochondrial evolution.
The pea crab, a tiny parasite living inside mussels, exhibits distinct sexual dimorphism where females remain permanently inside the host while males exit to mate. Males possess specialized swimming adaptations and hardened exoskeletons to navigate the open water, despite facing significant risks of injury or death during these excursions. This behavior is driven by the high reproductive payoff, as a single female can produce over 9,000 eggs, with larval stages eventually returning to settle in new mussel hosts.
University of British Columbia researchers have described two new species of sea spiders in the Salish Sea, the first such discoveries in the region in nearly a century. The study, published in Organisms Diversity & Evolution, details Callipallene pilosuspedes, a species with red eyes and hairy legs, and Tanystylum kiixin, a parasitic species that hosts its own smaller parasites. The findings highlight the need for better biodiversity data to assess climate change impacts on marine invertebrates.
A new commentary in Animal Behaviour challenges the popular narrative that Toxoplasma gondii manipulates host behavior to facilitate transmission. While the parasite is known to infect warm-blooded vertebrates and requires cats for reproduction, zoologist Andrew Davinack argues that many observed behavioral changes may be the result of 'ecological sorting' rather than direct manipulation. Davinack suggests that animals with naturally risky traits are more likely to encounter the parasite, creating a correlation that mimics causation. However, controlled lab studies still show specific behavioral shifts, such as reduced fear of cat odors in rodents, suggesting the parasite does have some influence, but the evidence in wild populations remains ambiguous due to methodological limitations.
Researchers at the University of Washington analyzed 178 cans of salmon preserved since the 1970s to track changes in marine parasite populations across four decades. By dissecting the fish, they found that Anisakidae worm counts increased in chum and pink salmon but remained stable in coho and sockeye. This unexpected archive provides a unique historical record of ecosystem health in the Gulf of Alaska and Bristol Bay, demonstrating how food preservation can serve as a scientific time capsule.
A tongue-eating isopod (Cymothoa exigua) enters a fish through the gills, drains blood from the tongue to cause it to wither, and then clamps onto the tongue’s stump to function as the fish’s new tongue for the rest of its life. The species is protandrous hermaphroditic, with rare cases of a female at the tongue site and a male in the gill chamber; researchers have identified related mouth-dwelling isopods (including Cymothoa facimar) and noted how parasite load can vary with fishing pressure and market sightings.
A team analyzing Vindolanda’s latrine drain found parasite eggs—Ascaris and Trichuris—and Giardia duodenalis in a subset of 58 sediment samples, with 28% testing positive. The findings show repeated exposure to contaminated water and food at a Roman frontier fort despite baths and aqueducts, indicating infections persisted across generations and that sanitation infrastructure wasn’t enough to prevent disease at isolated outposts; these patterns echo evidence from other forts and highlight potential zoonotic routes linked to diet.
Researchers have developed a new blood test to detect the brainworm Parelaphostrongylus tenuis in live moose and other wildlife, aiding in tracking and managing the spread of this deadly parasite that affects herbivores like moose and elk across North America.