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Parasites might spur evolution of strange amphibian breeding habits
11-14-2007 · EurekAlert!Parasites can decimate amphibian populations, but one University of Georgia researcher believes they might also play a role in spurring the evolution of new and sometimes bizarre breeding strategies.
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Keywords: parasites, spur, evolution, strange, amphibian, breeding, habits, parasite, habit
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- Uncertainty of rainfall breeds cooperation in birds, study finds
08-16-2007 · EurekAlert!
For the first time, Cornell researchers have linked a specific aspect of the environment to the evolution of cooperative breeding in numerous bird species: unpredictable rainfall. Their findings on African starlings appear in the Aug. 21 issue of Current Biology.
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- Sugar identified as key to malaria parasite invasion
09-10-2007 · EurekAlert!
Researchers at the Johns Hopkins Malaria Research Institute have identified a sugar in mosquitoes that allows the malaria-causing parasite to attach itself to the mosquito's gut. Invasion of the midgut cell layer is an essential stage in the parasite's lifecycle and in malaria transmission. By reducing the level of the sugar, chondroitin sulfate, in the mosquito, the researchers prevented 95 percent of the parasites in the mosquito from attaching to the gut, thus blocking its development.
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- Trends in bird observations reveal species' changing fortunes
04-02-2007 · EurekAlert!
Some 40 years of observations catalogued in the North American Breeding Bird Survey show strikingly different changes in the circumstances of birds preferring various habitats and with various migratory habits
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- Uncertainty drives the evolution of 'cooperative breeding' in birds
08-16-2007 · EurekAlert!
Rather than striking out to start a family of their own, members of some bird species will stick around longer to help a relative raise their young. Now, researchers report evidence that in African starlings such altruistic tendencies are most common among species that live in savannas, where the rainfall in any given year is virtually impossible to predict.
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- Studies of population genetics, evolution are an exercise in bad taste
02-16-2007 · UT Southwestern Medical Center
Scientific studies of why foods such as Brussels sprouts and stout beer are horribly bitter-tasting to some people but palatable to others are shedding light on a number of questions, from the mechanisms of natural selection to understanding how our genes affect our dietary habits.
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- Multiple malaria infection inhibits spread of parasite
03-25-2007 · EurekAlert!
People who are frequently infected with malaria parasites can develop immunity against the gametocyte, the infectious stage. This immunity inhibits the spread of the parasite. Dutch researcher Mike van der Kolk discovered this during his research into malaria transmission under the inhabitants of Cameroon, Senegal and Indonesia. After just a few infections, people can develop immunity that inhibits transmission.
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- Researchers reveal genetic secrets of devastating human parasite
09-20-2007 · EurekAlert!
An international team of researchers has revealed the genetic secrets of one of the world's most debilitating human parasites, Brugia malayi, which the World Health Organization estimates has seriously incapacitated and disfigured more than 40 million people around the globe. The study reveals dozens of potential new targets for drugs or vaccines and should provide new opportunities for understanding, treating and preventing elephantiasis, the disfiguring disease caused by the Brugia malayi parasite.
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- Sea cucumber protein used to inhibit development of malaria parasite
12-20-2007 · EurekAlert!
Scientists have genetically engineered a mosquito to release a sea-cucumber protein into its gut which impairs the development of malaria parasites, according to research out today (Dec. 21) in PLoS Pathogens. Researchers say this development is a step towards developing future methods of preventing the transmission of malaria.
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- Scientists sequence genome of intestinal parasite that afflicts hikers and kids in daycare
09-27-2007 · EurekAlert!
Giardia lamblia is a strange-looking parasite that swims in the gut, spreads through stool, persists in contaminated water, and is responsible for more than 20,000 reported infections a year in the US. An international team of researchers led by scientists at the Marine Biological Laboratory in Woods Hole, Mass., and funded by NIAID, one of the National Institutes of Health, describes the complete genetic sequence of the parasite.
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- Ant parasite turns host into ripe red berry, biologists discover
01-16-2008 · EurekAlert!
Parasites occasionally change the behavior or looks of their host, but a nasty tropical nematode alters both, making its ant host's parasite-filled abdomen resemble a ripe red berry. According to UC Berkeley and University of Arkansas biologists, this behavior is a strategy the nematode evolved to entice birds to eat the ant's abdomen and spread the parasite in their droppings.
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