Ecology And Physiology Of Parasites

Increasing wisdom and ingenuity are required if we are to master our environment and cope with the myriad of organisms that affect our existence. Not the least of these organisms are the parasites and pathogens which can be found in all animals. The ecological implications of parasitism are obvious, and the interrelationships among different organisms within the same host are fascinating, but more knowledge and understanding are needed. The symposium are held to stimulate discussion of the significance of ecological problems presented by parasites and to develop means of attacking some of these problems. The diversity of parasitism from protozoa to anthropods was emphasized and the speakers and topics were selected to interest those in various biological disciplines and professions. Organized by the Department of Parasitology in the School of Hygiene of the University of Toronto, and held at Toronto in February 1970, the symposium was an unqualified success. The enthusiastic interest, indicated by the attendance of over three hundred people from seven countries, and numerous requests for copies of the proceedings led to the publication in this volume of the twelve papers presented at the symposium. The opening remarks of the leader of the discussion which follow each paper have been included and a complete bibliography is provided for each topic. The contributors are leading specialists in their fields; their papers present the results of the most recent research and assemble and review the scattered literature on each topic. The text is illustrated throughout with diagrams and photographs. Parasitism and associated phenomena are excellent examples of problems requiring the interdisciplinary approach taken by the symposium. The results of such an approach are useful in a wide variety of disciplines: microbiology, invertebrate zoology, entomology, and tropical medicine, as well as parasitology.

THIS BOOK HAS BEEN DEVELOPED FROM A SHORT LECTURE COURSE GIVEN to advanced undergraduate students as part of a general introduction to the subject of parasitology for zoologists. The book is written for the undergraduate who has no previous experience of parasitology and little background in either biochemistry or physiology. It is not a long book, and students will have to consult some of the more detailed textbooks in parasitology and physiology to gain a full understanding of the topics considered here. My objective in writing this book is to introduce the breadth of parasite physiology, leaving the reader to obtain a depth of knowledge by his own library research. Each chapter covers a single topic or related topics in physiological parasitology, and the variable length of the chapters reflects the amount of research interest that has been generated over the last few decades. It is to be hoped that by use of this book students will develop an interest in some of the more neglected areas and be stimulated to make good some of the more glaring deficiencies in our current knowledge. I should like to acknowledge with gratitude the assistance of my colleagues Dr 1. Barrett, Dr R. A. Klein, Dr A. W. Pike and Dr R. A.

Series Editor: Peter Calow, Department of Zoology, University of Sheffield, England The main aim of this series will be to illustrate and to explain the way organisms 'make a living' in nature. At the heart of this - their functional biology - is the way organisms acquire and then make use of resources in metabolism, movement, growth, reproduction, and so on. These processes will form the fundamental framework of all the books in the series. Each book will concentrate on a particular taxon (species, family, class or even phylum) and will bring together information on the form, physiology, ecology and evolutionary biology of the group. The aim will be not only to describe how organisms work, but also to consider why they have come to work in that way. By concentration on taxa which are well known, it is hoped that the series will not only illustrate the success of selection, but also show the constraints imposed upon it by the physiological, morphological and developmental limitations of the groups. Another important feature of the series will be its organismic orientation. Each book will emphasize the importance of functional integration in the day to-day lives and the evolution of organisms. This is crucial since, though it may be true that organisms can be considered as collections of gene determined traits, they nevertheless interact with their environment as integrated wholes and it is in this context that individual traits have been subjected to natural selection and have evolved.

In spite of the fact that parasites represent more than half of all living species of plants and animals, their role in the evolution of life on earth has been substantially underestimated. Here, for the first time within an evolutionary and ecological framework, Peter Price integrates the biological attributes that characterize parasites ranging from such diverse groups as viruses, bacteria, protozoa, and fungi, to helminths, mites, insects, and parasitic flowering plants. Synthesizing systematics, ecology, behavioral biology, genetics, and biogeography, the author outlines the success of parasitism as a mode of life, the common features of the wide range of organisms that adopt such a way of life, the reasons for parasites' extraordinary potential for continued adaptive radiation, and their role in molding community structure by means of their impact on the evolution of host species. In demonstrating the importance of parasitic interactions for determining population patterns and geographical distributions, Dr. Price generates further discussion and suggests new areas for research.