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The wild world of Guinea Worms: A review of the genus Dracunculus in wildlife

Nematodes are an extremely diverse and speciose group of parasites. Adult dracunculoid nematodes (Superfamily Dracunculoidea) occur in the tissues and serous cavities of mammals, fish, reptiles, amphibians and birds. Of the dracunculid group, perhaps best known is Dracunculus medinensis, the human G...

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Autores principales: Cleveland, Christopher A., Garrett, Kayla B., Cozad, Rebecca A., Williams, Brianna M., Murray, Maureen H., Yabsley, Michael J.
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Elsevier 2018
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6072916/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/30094178
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ijppaw.2018.07.002
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author Cleveland, Christopher A.
Garrett, Kayla B.
Cozad, Rebecca A.
Williams, Brianna M.
Murray, Maureen H.
Yabsley, Michael J.
author_facet Cleveland, Christopher A.
Garrett, Kayla B.
Cozad, Rebecca A.
Williams, Brianna M.
Murray, Maureen H.
Yabsley, Michael J.
author_sort Cleveland, Christopher A.
collection PubMed
description Nematodes are an extremely diverse and speciose group of parasites. Adult dracunculoid nematodes (Superfamily Dracunculoidea) occur in the tissues and serous cavities of mammals, fish, reptiles, amphibians and birds. Of the dracunculid group, perhaps best known is Dracunculus medinensis, the human Guinea Worm. Considerable work has been done on D. medinensis; however recent infections in peri-domestic dogs and the finding of naturally-infected paratenic hosts (previously unreported for D. medinensis) indicate we still have much to learn about these parasites. Furthermore, among eight species in the Old World and six species in the New World there is a lack of general life history knowledge as well as questions on species occurrence, host diversity, and transmission dynamics. Herein, we provide a comprehensive review of the genus Dracunculus, in order of a theoretical evolutionary progression from reptilian to mammalian hosts. Species descriptions, where available, are provided but also show where gaps occur in our knowledge of various species. Additionally, many first reports of Dracunculus spp. were done prior to the development and use of molecular tools. This is especially important for this group of parasites as speciation based on morphology is only applicable to males of the genus, and males, given their size, are notoriously difficult to recover from definitive hosts. Therefore, we also discuss current molecular tools used in the investigation of this group of parasites. Given recent host-switching events, the dracunculids are of increasing importance and require further work to expand our understanding of this genus.
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spelling pubmed-60729162018-08-09 The wild world of Guinea Worms: A review of the genus Dracunculus in wildlife Cleveland, Christopher A. Garrett, Kayla B. Cozad, Rebecca A. Williams, Brianna M. Murray, Maureen H. Yabsley, Michael J. Int J Parasitol Parasites Wildl Article Nematodes are an extremely diverse and speciose group of parasites. Adult dracunculoid nematodes (Superfamily Dracunculoidea) occur in the tissues and serous cavities of mammals, fish, reptiles, amphibians and birds. Of the dracunculid group, perhaps best known is Dracunculus medinensis, the human Guinea Worm. Considerable work has been done on D. medinensis; however recent infections in peri-domestic dogs and the finding of naturally-infected paratenic hosts (previously unreported for D. medinensis) indicate we still have much to learn about these parasites. Furthermore, among eight species in the Old World and six species in the New World there is a lack of general life history knowledge as well as questions on species occurrence, host diversity, and transmission dynamics. Herein, we provide a comprehensive review of the genus Dracunculus, in order of a theoretical evolutionary progression from reptilian to mammalian hosts. Species descriptions, where available, are provided but also show where gaps occur in our knowledge of various species. Additionally, many first reports of Dracunculus spp. were done prior to the development and use of molecular tools. This is especially important for this group of parasites as speciation based on morphology is only applicable to males of the genus, and males, given their size, are notoriously difficult to recover from definitive hosts. Therefore, we also discuss current molecular tools used in the investigation of this group of parasites. Given recent host-switching events, the dracunculids are of increasing importance and require further work to expand our understanding of this genus. Elsevier 2018-07-19 /pmc/articles/PMC6072916/ /pubmed/30094178 http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ijppaw.2018.07.002 Text en © 2018 The Authors http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).
spellingShingle Article
Cleveland, Christopher A.
Garrett, Kayla B.
Cozad, Rebecca A.
Williams, Brianna M.
Murray, Maureen H.
Yabsley, Michael J.
The wild world of Guinea Worms: A review of the genus Dracunculus in wildlife
title The wild world of Guinea Worms: A review of the genus Dracunculus in wildlife
title_full The wild world of Guinea Worms: A review of the genus Dracunculus in wildlife
title_fullStr The wild world of Guinea Worms: A review of the genus Dracunculus in wildlife
title_full_unstemmed The wild world of Guinea Worms: A review of the genus Dracunculus in wildlife
title_short The wild world of Guinea Worms: A review of the genus Dracunculus in wildlife
title_sort wild world of guinea worms: a review of the genus dracunculus in wildlife
topic Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6072916/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/30094178
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ijppaw.2018.07.002
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