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Morphological comparison of genetically differentiated Polymorphus cf. minutus types

  • Helminthology - Original Paper
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Abstract

In the present study, we analyzed the morphology of three genetic types of the bird-infecting acanthocephalan Polymorphus cf. minutus (PspT1, PspT2, PspT3), mainly based on the cystacanth-stage obtained from amphipods (Gammarus fossarum, Gammarus pulex, Gammarus roeselii, Echinogammarus spp.). Males and females were pooled as there was no considerable difference between the sexes concerning the hook measurements. Additionally, we conducted a laboratory infection of one domestic duck for each Polymorphus type, to compare their performance and localization in this host species, and to obtain adult specimens for morphological comparison. The recovery rate from the ducks 4 weeks after infection was 16% for PspT1, 23.8% for PspT2, and 25% for PspT3. The adult worms were gravid, and the females contained mature eggs. Hook size did not differ considerably between cystacanths and adults of the respective type. The three Polymorphus types could be distinguished based on the cystacanth stage by a linear discriminant analysis that included hook measurements, proboscis length, proboscis width, and number of longitudinal hook rows and hooks per row. Furthermore, PspT3 was more different from PspT1 and PspT2 than the latter types from each other. Mainly the number of longitudinal hook rows differed in PspT3 from the existing descriptions of P. minutus (mainly 14 vs. mainly 16 rows). Potentially, PspT3 could be a non-indigenous parasite that was introduced with G. roeselii and that adapted to use the indigenous G. pulex as a host, while PspT2 might have been introduced to central Europe together with Echinogammarus spp.

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Acknowledgments

We thank Dr. Christian Feld for the help with the statistical analyses.

Funding

The research of PH and JB was supported by institutional funding (Charles University PROGRES Q43 and UNCE/SCI/012-204072/2018).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Aquatic Ecology and Centre for Water and Environmental Research, University of Duisburg-Essen, Universitätsstr. 5, 45141, Essen, Germany

    Daniel Grabner, Annemie Doliwa & Bernd Sures

  2. Department of Parasitology, Charles University, Viničná 7, CZ-128 44, Prague 2, Czechia

    Jana Bulantová & Petr Horák

  3. Department of Zoology, University of Johannesburg, PO Box 524, Auckland Park, Johannesburg, 2006, South Africa

    Bernd Sures

Authors
  1. Daniel Grabner
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  2. Annemie Doliwa
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  3. Jana Bulantová
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  4. Petr Horák
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  5. Bernd Sures
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Daniel Grabner.

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Ethical approval

All applicable international, national, and/or institutional guidelines for the care and use of animals were followed. Animal experimentation was approved (ref. no. MSMT-31114/2013-9 and MSMT-33740/2017-2) by Charles University and the Czech Ministry of Education, Youth and Sports, and was conducted in accordance with the European Directive 2010/63/EU and Czech Law for Biomedical Research (246/1992 and 359/2012).

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The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.

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Section Editor: David Bruce Conn

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Electronic supplementary material

Online resource 1

Raw data measurements on cystacanths and adult worms and summary statistics (XLSX 36 kb)

Online resource 2

Detailed results of the statistical analysis (XLSX 43 kb)

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Grabner, D., Doliwa, A., Bulantová, J. et al. Morphological comparison of genetically differentiated Polymorphus cf. minutus types. Parasitol Res 119, 153–163 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00436-019-06525-1

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