A month for the mission: using a sentinel approach to determine the transmission window of digenean cercariae in the subarctic White Sea

2021 ◽  
Vol 95 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kirill E. Nikolaev ◽  
Ivan A. Levakin ◽  
Kirill V. Galaktionov

Abstract In the digenean life cycle the cercaria ensures an important transmission stage, from the first intermediate host to the second or the definitive host. In regions with pronounced seasonality, this process occurs within a certain interval, the transmission window. In high latitudes, the size of transmission window has previously been determined only by comparing data on seasonal dynamics of infection level in various categories of hosts or extrapolating the results of laboratory experiments on cercarial biology to natural conditions. In this study, we evaluated the dynamics of infection of the second intermediate hosts (mussels Mytilus edulis) with cercariae of two digenean species, Himasthla elongata (Himasthlidae) and Cercaria parvicaudata (Renicolidae), at a littoral site at the White Sea by exposing cages with uninfected mussels during the warm season. This is the first such study in a subarctic sea. Mussel infection was observed from May to mid-September, but its intensity was the greatest only for approximately a month, from some moment after 10 July to mid-August, when water temperature was within the optimal range for cercarial emergence in both studied species (15‒20°C). During this time, the mussels accumulated 66.3 ± 6.2% metacercariae of H. elongata and 79.7 ± 5.3% metacercariae of C. parvicaudata out of the total number accumulated during the experimental period. We suggest that climate warming at high latitudes may prolong the period when the water temperatures are optimal for cercariae emergence, thereby intensifying digenean transmission in coastal ecosystems.

2012 ◽  
Vol 87 (2) ◽  
pp. 180-188 ◽  
Author(s):  
I.A. Levakin ◽  
E.A. Losev ◽  
K.E. Nikolaev ◽  
K.V. Galaktionov

AbstractInfectivity of Himasthla elongata cercariae to mussels, their second intermediate hosts, and resistance by these hosts to infection were assessed on the basis of the cercariae's ability to encyst in mussel haemolymph in vitro. A series of experimental in vivo infections of mussels with batches of cercariae, each batch released from a different single infected mollusc and referred to as a clone (due to their shared genotype), demonstrated that the results of the in vitro tests corresponded to the actual indices of infectivity/susceptibility of the parasites and their hosts. Most cercarial clones had high infectivity, with a few clones having very high or, at the other extreme, very low infectivity. A similar pattern was revealed in mussel resistance to cercarial infection. Most of the molluscs tested were moderately susceptible to cercarial infection, but at each extreme a small fraction (less than 10%) displayed very high or very low susceptibility. It was shown that there were no totally compatible or totally incompatible ‘cercaria clone/mussel’ combinations. Results obtained are compared with the data on intra-population variability using the characters parasite infectivity/host compatibility for trematode/mollusc–first intermediate host associations. Results are made relevant to actual infection levels in mussel settlements at the White Sea.


2011 ◽  
Vol 20 (2) ◽  
pp. 121-126 ◽  
Author(s):  
Fagner Luiz da Costa Freitas ◽  
Beatriz Lie Yamamoto ◽  
Wagner Luiz da Costa Freitas ◽  
Jose Jurandir Fagliari ◽  
Katyane de Sousa Almeida ◽  
...  

Hemograms and acute-phase proteins in adult male New Zealand White rabbits that had been experimentally infected orally with sporulated oocysts of Eimeria stiedai were evaluated over a 28-day period. Fifty animals were used, divided into two groups: group A infected with 1 × 10(4) sporulated oocysts of E. stiedai and group B inoculated with distilled water. On the seventh day after infection, the infected animals presented anemia and leukocytosis with neutrophilia and monocytosis. Protein fractionation by means of electrophoresis identified 19 acute-phase proteins with molecular weights ranging from 24 to 238 kD. Ceruloplasmin, transferrin and haptoglobin showed high levels on the seventh day after infection, with gradual increases in their concentrations until the end of the experimental period. Thus, from the data of the present study, E. stiedai is considered to be a pyogenic etiological agent for which the infection level can be monitored through the leukocyte count and serum concentrations of ceruloplasmin, transferrin and haptoglobin, and these can be recommended as complementary tests.


Author(s):  
Алексей Вадимович Зимин ◽  
Алексей Владимирович Толстиков ◽  
Aleksey Zimin ◽  
Aleksey Tolstikov

Parasitology ◽  
1983 ◽  
Vol 86 (4) ◽  
pp. 121-160 ◽  
Author(s):  
P. J. Whitfield ◽  
N. A. Evans

SUMMARYAmong flatworms with parasitic and commensal modes of existence, parthenogenesis and asexual multiplication appear to be largely confined to the Digenea and Cestoda, the only parasitic platyhelminths that routinely utilize indirect life-cycles. Parthenogenesis is apparently restricted to a minority of adult digeneans and cestodes inhabiting their final hosts, and a survey is made of the particular modes of parthenogenesis (i.e. apomictic, automictic and generative) which are employed by such adults. Asexual (amictic) multiplication, in the form of fissioning, is demonstrated by young adults of the cyclophyllidean cestode, Mesoces-toides corti, but is otherwise not exhibited by adult cestodes or digeneans, other than in the perplexing phenomenon of proglottid formation in polyzoic tapeworms. Secondary multiplication is of ubiquitous occurrence in digenean life-cycles in the form of the proliferation which takes place within sporocysts and rediae (germinal sacs) located in the first intermediate host. The controversy concerning the nature of this multiplication is reconsidered in the context of recent findings which have centred on cellular aspects. On the basis of present evidence germinal sac multiplication should be regarded as an asexual rather than a parthen-ogenetic process. The cestode asexual multiplication which occurs in intermediate hosts is a function of the metacestode stage of development. Metacestode proliferation is only known from about 20 species and 6 families of polyzoic cestodes with approximately half the described instances occurring in the family Taeniidae. The organization of these proliferative metacestodes, findings concerning their totipotent stem cells and the ontogeny of buds and new scolices are all reviewed. Finally, the capacity for population expansion of multiplicative larval digeneans and metacestodes are compared, while the ecological roles and the genetical consequences of both parthenogenesis and amictic multiplication in the two taxa are also examined.


1987 ◽  
Vol 65 (10) ◽  
pp. 2491-2497 ◽  
Author(s):  
Murray J. Kennedy ◽  
L. M. Killick ◽  
M. Beverley-Burton

Life cycle studies of Paradistomum geckonum (Dicrocoeliidae) were attempted experimentally. The pulmonate gastropod Lamellaxis gracilis served as the first intermediate host; geckonid lizards (Cosymbotus platyurus, Gehyra mutilata, and Hemidactylus frenatus) served as definitive hosts. The life cycle of Mesocoelium sociale (Mesocoeliidae) was studied in naturally infected first intermediate hosts (L. gracilis, Huttonella bicolor) and experimentally in geckonid definitive hosts (C. platyurus, G. mutilata, and H. frenatus). Some naturally infected L. gracilis were infected concurrently with larval stages of both digeneans. Second intermediate hosts, presumed to be arthropods, were experimentally unnecessary. Metacercariae of P. geckonum were not found. Cercariae of M. sociale formed encysted metacercariae in the same individual snails.


1986 ◽  
Vol 34 (2) ◽  
pp. 279 ◽  
Author(s):  
TH Cribb

Stemmatostoma pearsoni, gen. et sp. nov., is described from the intestine of Leiopotherapon unicolor (Gunther) and Macquaria novemaculeata (Steindachner) in Queensland. Stemmatostoma is placed within the Neochasminae and is distinguished by its long oesophagus, compact ovary, short caeca, pre-ovarian vitellaria, simple gonotyl and funnel-shaped oral sucker. The diagnosis of the Neochasminae is emended excluding Parspina Pearse. Telogaster opisthorchis Macfarlane is recorded from the intestine of Anguilla reinhardtii Steindachner from Victoria. The spinose oral suckers of S. pearsoni and T. opisthorchis are capable of being retracted into tegumental pockets. It is postulated that this arrangement may be widespread amongst spinose cryptogonimids. The first intermediate host of S. pearsoni is Posticobia brazieri (Smith), a prosobranch snail. The second intermediate hosts are freshwater fish: Hypseleotris galii (Ogilby), H. compressus (Krefft), Mogurnda mogurnda (Richardson), M. adspersa (Castelnau), Philypnodon grandiceps (Krefft), Gobiomorphus australis (Krefft), and Pseudomugil signifer Kner. Within the snail there is a mother sporocyst generation, a redial generation and a cercarial generation. Development of the mother sporocyst is similar to that described for other opisthorchioids. Cryptogonimid cercariae are characterized by 16 flame-cells, pre-vesicular penetration glands, dorso-ventral caudal finfolds and absence of body pigmentation. On the basis of cercarial and adult morphology it is proposed that Pseudexorchis Yamaguti be excluded from the Cryptogonimidae.


Parasitology ◽  
1994 ◽  
Vol 109 (1) ◽  
pp. 65-72 ◽  
Author(s):  
C. A. Lowenberger ◽  
M. E. Rau

SUMMARYWe investigated changes in the behaviour of Stagnicola elodes associated with the emergence of Plagiorchis elegans cercariae. Within 15 min of the reduction in light intensity, which triggered the onset of cercarial emergence, infected snails moved to the top of the water column and remained there for 2–3 h. Seventy-nine percent of all cercariae that emerged from the snail did so during this period. Uninfected snails showed no such behavioural changes following the change in light intensity. Cercariae were released in a dense cloud around the snail at the water surface and dispersed passively. Within 3–4 h more than 80% of all cercariae had settled in the bottom 5 cm of the water column. The infectivity of cercariae increased from less than 20% upon emergence from the snail to greater than 75% 4–6 h post-emergence, and then declined steadily to below 5% by 24 h post-emergence. Cercarial longevity was greater than 30 h and exceeded the period of infectivity. This may be related to steadily falling endogenous glycogen levels. A delay in attaining maximum infectivity may represent an adaptive mechanism allowing time for cercarial dissemination, thus reducing superinfection, and subsequent parasite-associated mortality, of second intermediate hosts.


2005 ◽  
Vol 79 (1) ◽  
pp. 67-73 ◽  
Author(s):  
K.A. Padgett ◽  
W.M. Boyce

AbstractThis study tested the hypotheses that ants (Formicidae) function as a first intermediate host of Mesocestoides (Cestoda: Mesocestoididae) and that deer mice (Peromyscus maniculatus) develop metacestode infections after ingesting cysticercoid or procercoid-infected ants. Field studies were conducted at an island fox (Urocyon littoralis littoralis) breeding facility located on San Miguel Island, California Channel Islands National Park, USA, where >40% of captive foxes were infected with adult Mesocestoides. Eight percent (8%) of deer mice at the fox pen site were infected with Mesocestoides metacestodes while none were infected at a distant site where foxes were absent (campground), thereby indicating the potential localized presence of a first intermediate host. To test whether ants from San Miguel Island contained Mesocestoides DNA, a polymerase chain reaction (PCR)-based diagnostic assay was developed using nested primers that could detect a single hexacanth larva within pooled samples of ten ants. Ants (Lasius niger and Tapinoma sessile) collected near the fox breeding facility were tested using the nested-PCR assay. Seven of 223 pooled samples of L. niger (3.1%) and 2 of 84 pooled samples of T. sessile (2.4%) tested positive for Mesocestoides DNA, while none of the ants were positive at the campground site. Positive samples were sequenced and found to match DNA sequences from Mesocestoides obtained from island fox and deer mice. Finally, to determine whether ants function as a first intermediate host for Mesocestoides, colony-raised deer mice (n=47) were fed L. niger (n=3860) or T. sessile (n=339) collected from the San Miguel Island fox breeding facility. No mouse became infected with Mesocestoides metacestodes after ingesting ants. While both L. niger and T. sessile from SMI were positive for Mesocestoides DNA, they were not infective to deer mice in the laboratory.


2020 ◽  
Vol 17 (9) ◽  
pp. 2521-2536 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jiantao Cao ◽  
Zhiguo Rao ◽  
Fuxi Shi ◽  
Guodong Jia

Abstract. It has been frequently found that lacustrine branched glycerol dialkyl glycerol tetraethers (brGDGT)-derived temperatures are warm-season-biased relative to measured mean annual air temperature (AT) in the middle to high latitudes, the mechanism of which, however, is not very clear. Here, we investigated the brGDGTs from catchment soils, suspended particulate matter (SPM) and surface sediments in different water depths in Gonghai Lake in northern China to explore this question. Our results showed that the brGDGT distribution in sediments resembled that in the SPM but differed from the surrounding soils, suggesting a substantial aquatic origin of the brGDGTs in the lake. Moreover, the increase in brGDGT content and decrease in methylation index with water depth in sediments suggested more contribution of aquatic brGDGTs produced from deep or bottom waters. Therefore, established lake-specific calibrations were applied to estimate local mean annual AT. As usual, the estimates were significantly higher than the measured mean annual AT. However, they were similar to (and thus actually reflected) the mean annual lake water temperature (LWT). Interestingly, the mean annual LWT is close to the measured mean warm-season AT, thus suggesting that the apparent warm-season bias of lacustrine brGDGT-derived temperatures could be caused by the discrepancy between AT and LWT. In our study region, ice forms at the lake surface during winter, leading to isolation of the underlying lake water from air and hence higher LWT than AT, while LWT basically follows AT during warm seasons when ice disappears. Therefore, we think that lacustrine brGDGTs actually reflected the mean annual LWT, which is higher than the mean annual AT in our study location. Since the decoupling between LWT and AT in winter due to ice formation is a universal physical phenomenon in the middle to high latitudes, we propose this phenomenon could be also the reason for the widely observed warm-season bias of brGDGT-derived temperatures in other seasonally surface ice-forming lakes, especially in shallow lakes.


2018 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
pp. 263-273 ◽  
Author(s):  
Bruno I Cappellozza ◽  
Pedro V F Lasmar ◽  
Flávea T Reis ◽  
Leane Oliveira ◽  
Fernanda Hoe ◽  
...  

Abstract This study aimed to evaluate the effects of supplement type and narasin inclusion on the frequency and supplement intake of grazing Bos indicus beef bulls. Four hundred animals were ranked by initial BW (383 ± 35 kg) and allocated into one of four paddocks of Brachiaria brizantha cv. Marandú (100 animals/paddock). Paddocks were randomly assigned to receive either a mineral salt (MIN) or a protein-energetic supplement (PREN) containing or not narasin (N) for a 90-d period. An individual electronic data capture system with 11 feed bunks was used to individually measure supplement intake and meal frequency in each paddock. The evaluations and analysis of individual intake, frequency of visits to the feeder, and intake per visit (I/V) were performed every 15 d and classified as periods (PR1 through PR6). All data were analyzed as a 2 × 2 factorial design with the PROC MIXED procedure of SAS. A supplement type × N × PR interaction was observed (P < 0.0001) for daily supplement intake. No differences were observed between MIN, whereas PREN had a greater (P ≤ 0.03) supplement intake on PR1 and PR3, but a reduced supplement intake on PR6 compared with PREN + N (P = 0.02). Moreover, no supplement type × N interaction (P = 0.47) or N (P = 0.44) effects were observed for daily supplement intake in the present study. A supplement type × N × PR interaction was detected (P < 0.0001) for the frequency of visits in the feeders. Throughout the experimental period, animals from the MIN + N had a greater (P ≤ 0.02) frequency of visits compared with MIN cohorts. A supplement effect was detected for I/V (P = 0.02), whereas neither a narasin effect (P = 0.74) nor interactions (P ≥ 0.16) were observed. Animals offered PREN had a greater I/V when compared with MIN cohorts (145 vs. 846 g/d for MIN and PREN, respectively; SEM = 16.1). When these data are reported as percentage of days visiting the feeder within each PR, MIN and MIN + N animals visited the feeder for 25.8% and 35.9% of the days, respectively. Conversely, no differences were observed (P = 0.65) in the overall mean visits per PR between PREN and PREN + N (12.8 vs. 12.3 d for PREN and PREN + N, respectively; SEM = 0.195). As percentage of days visiting the feeder, PREN and PREN + N visited the feeder for 85.1% and 81.9% of the days, respectively. In summary, narasin inclusion did not reduce supplement intake, regardless of supplement type, but increased the frequency of visits to the feeder for the MIN treatment.


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