Biology Reference
In-Depth Information
TABLE 10.1 Summary of definitive hosts for selected
species belonging to the family Ascarididae.
Species
Definitive host(s)
Humans
1
Non-human primates
100,101
Ascaris lumbricoides
Pigs
102
(Chimpanzees)
40
(Humans)
103
Ascaris suum
Red pandas
104
Baylisascaris ailuri
Skunks
102
Baylisascaris columnaris
Racoons
10
Baylisascaris procyonis
Giant pandas
105
Baylisascaris schroederi
Baylisascaris transfuga
Bears
Pandas
102
Equids
102
Parascaris equorum
Toxascaris leonina
Dogs
Wolves
Foxes
Cats
102
Dogs
102
Wolves
106,107
Toxocara canis
Cats
102
Toxocara cati
Cats
108
Toxocara malaysiensis
Fruit bats
102
Toxocara pteropodis
Cattle
102
Buffaloes
109
Bisons
110
Toxocara vitulorum
(Humans, Chimpanzees) indicates that while it is clear that A. suum can
infect these hosts, it appears to be better adapted to the pig host.
103
support for each clade than when nuclear or mitochondrial markers were
analyzed on their own.
6
It is evident that the inter-generic relationships of
these groups within Ascaridoidea are open to debate; however, relation-
ships within the family Ascarididae are perhaps less contentious. The
former problem is likely due to the poor phylogenetic performance of
these loci across “deep” evolutionary time spanning hundreds of millions
of years
5
and is also confounded by poor taxonomic sampling, meaning
that samples available for analysis are not evenly distributed across
genera. Thus some genera are very well represented (e.g. Toxocara spp.)
while others are not (e.g. Parascaris spp.),
8
leading to sampling biases.
