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Examples include: Acanthocephala; Ascariasis (roundworms) Cestoda (tapeworms) including: Taenia saginata (human beef tapeworm), Taenia solium (human pork tapeworm), Diphyllobothrium latum (fish tapeworm) and Echinococcosis (hydatid tapeworm) Clonorchis sinensis (the Chinese liver fluke) Dracunculus medinensis (Guinea worm) Enterobius ...
Definitive or primary host – an organism in which the parasite reaches the adult stage and reproduces sexually, if possible. This is the final host. Secondary or intermediate host – an organism that harbors the sexually immature parasite and is required by the parasite to undergo development and complete its life cycle. It often acts as a ...
Parasitism is a major aspect of evolutionary ecology; for example, almost all free-living animals are host to at least one species of parasite. Vertebrates, the best-studied group, are hosts to between 75,000 and 300,000 species of helminths and an uncounted number of parasitic microorganisms.
Parasites can provide information about host population ecology. In fisheries biology, for example, parasite communities can be used to distinguish distinct populations of the same fish species co-inhabiting a region. Additionally, parasites possess a variety of specialized traits and life-history strategies that enable them to colonize hosts.
Parasites often rely on one or multiple host species to complete their life cycle, and their presence can have profound effects on host populations, communities, and even entire ecosystems. [ 3 ] [ 4 ] One of the fundamental aspects of parasite ecology is their role as a trophic level within the food web . [ 5 ]
By way of example, a parasite that reproduces in an intermediate host may require, as part of their life cycle, that the intermediate host be eaten by a predator at a higher trophic level, and some parasites are capable of altering the behavior of the intermediate host to make such predation more likely; [1] [2] a mechanism that has been called ...
Human parasites are divided into endoparasites, which cause infection inside the body, and ectoparasites, which cause infection superficially within the skin. The cysts and eggs of endoparasites may be found in feces , which aids in the detection of the parasite in the human host while also providing the means for the parasitic species to exit ...
The parasite may live outside of the host ectoparasite; for example, a tick. Alternatively, the parasite may live within the host endoparasite ; for example, the fluke . An obligate parasite that does not live directly in or on the host, but rather acts at a distance – for example, a cuckoo which hatches and is raised by non-relatives – is ...