M odel organisms are essential for biological and biomedical research. They enable scientists to study human diseases faster, cheaper and at a larger scale than in humans, or in human tissue or cell lines. Furthermore, animal models, such as fruit flies, roundworms, mice and rats, allow the study of normal and pathological processes in a controlled and systematic way to investigate specific hyp...

BACKGROUND When chromatin diminution occurs during a cell division a portion of the chromatin is eliminated, resulting in daughter cells with a smaller amount of genetic material. In the parasitic roundworms Ascaris and Parascaris, chromatin diminution creates a genetic difference between the soma and the germline. However, the function of chromatin diminution remains a mystery, because the vas...

Chitin (β-1,4-linked-N-acetylglucosamine) provides structural integrity to the nematode eggshell and pharyngeal lining. Chitin is synthesized in nematodes, but not in plants and vertebrates, which are often hosts to parasitic roundworms; hence, the chitin metabolism pathway is considered a potential target for selective interventions. Polysaccharide deacetylases (PDAs), including those that con...

The presence of gastro-intestinal parasites in Tswana kids (n = 7) aged 1-3 weeks was studied for a period of 6 months at the Botswana College of Agriculture. The aims of this study were to find the time when they first contracted internal parasite infections, as well as to determine the severity of the infections and also its relation to production indicators (body mass and packed cell volume)...

Morphological data traditionally group Tardigrada (water bears), Onychophora (velvet worms), and Arthropoda (e.g., spiders, insects, and their allies) into a monophyletic group of invertebrates with walking appendages known as the Panarthropoda. However, molecular data generally do not support the inclusion of tardigrades within the Panarthropoda, but instead place them closer to Nematoda (roun...

Pudgy roundworms storing a particular type of fat live longer than their more svelte counterparts, according to a study by researchers at the School of Medicine. This fatty buildup, and the subsequent increase in the worms’ life span, can be stimulated simply by feeding the animals monounsaturated fatty acids like those found in olive oil. Because many species share similar patterns of fat meta...

Roundworms of the genus Ascaris are common parasites of the human gastrointestinal tract. A battery of selective inhibitors protects them from host enzymes and the immune system. Here, a metallocarboxypeptidase (MCP) inhibitor, ACI, was identified in protein extracts from Ascaris by intensity-fading MALDI-TOF mass spectrometry. The 67-residue amino acid sequence of ACI showed no significant hom...

(a) Protists/protozoa Unicellular organism and reduced specimens of different origins (b) Helminths Worms, which belong to the animal phyla: Platyhelminthes (flatworms), Nemathelminthes, Aschelminthes (roundworms), Acanthocephala (thornyheaded worms), Annelida (e.g. leeches) or Pentastomida (tongue worms). The members of these different worms range in a size from a few millimetres up to 30 m. (...

BACKGROUND The combination of milbemycin oxime-praziquantel is widely used against the most common tapeworms and roundworms affecting cats. New veterinary presentations of this combination have recently been approved. OBJECTIVE The objective of this study was to compare the palatability of two products using this combination, Milpro(®) and Milbemax(®). METHODS In all, 20 adult cats and 20 k...

Flubendazole (FLUB) is a broad-spectrum benzimidazole anthelmintic, effective against endoparasites such as gastro-intestinal roundworms, gapeworms and tapeworms (2). This drug is widely used in the veterinary medicine of poultry. An administration of flubendazole can result in the presence of residues of the parent compound FLUB and its hydrolysed metabolite (HMET) and/or its reduced metabolit...