Chapter 15: Parasitism and Mutualism

12/01/2015

I. Coevolution
The change of a biological object triggered by the change of a
related object
o Change in at least two species genetic compositions
reciprocally affect each others evolution
This is evident in the interactions between parasites and their hosts
Symbiosis intimate association between two different organism
Very interconnected relationship
Parasite really needs the host in order to survive or reproduce
Can be positive, negative, or benign
Parasites usually regarded in term of their detrimental effects; but
theyre actually energy budget engineers
Draw resources from hosts:
can see stunted growth, sterility, etc
Parasites generally:
Usually much smaller than the host
Highly specialized
Reproduces more quickly
A heavy load of parasites is an infection
The outcome of an infection is disease
Parasites can be categorized by size: micro and macro parasites
Microparasites
Usually associated with disease

Short generation time and multiply rapidly within hosts; usually

complete life cycle with one host
Macroparasites
Grow slower, longer generation time, larger
Roundworms, flatworms
Infections tend to be chronic and accumulate slowly
Hemiparasites
Photosynthetic but steal the water
Example: mistletoe
o Actually makes an excellent habitat for a lot of different
animals
Holoparasites
Steal water and sugars from the host
Ectoparasites
Live on the outside of the host
Live in scales, hair, skin, feathers for vertebrates
Live on the legs, upper and lower body part, etc for insects
Endoparasites
Live on the inside of the host
How parasites get into their hosts
Can enter through mouth, nasal passages, skin, rectum
They then travel to preferred habitat
Direct Transmission

Direct contact is the easiest to understand

When it moves from one host to the next host but its the same
species
When people spread the cold or the flu
Can sometimes be spread airborne, water, or the environment
Transmission can occur between hosts
Many external macroparasites are spread directly
o Lice (crazy jumpers)
o Ticks
o Fleas
o Mange mites
Some lay their eggs directly on the host
Some parasitic plants use direct transmission: spread through root
grafts, when the roots of one tree grow onto the roots of a
neighboring tree and attach
Intermediate Vector
Some parasites are transmitted between hosts by an intermediate
vector often an arthropod
1) Lyme disease: chronic fatigue hosts are vertebrates, most
commonly birds, mice, deer, and humans
Larvae that hatch (free of bacteria), after they have a blood meal
they morph to a nymph, then they look for a second host where the
ideal group are rats/squirrels, but if they land on a human they also
infect the human
o After second nymph cycle they turn into adult and land on a
deer (deer ticks), where they mate and produce offspring,
and make eggs again
o The eggs are always free of the disease
o The true host is the mouse that is being the reservoir of the
disease
2) Malaria: disease caused by protist parasites mosquitoes
vector is a female mosquito

mosquitoes transmit more than 50% of the approx. 102

arboviruses, including yellow fever
more than 1 million are killed each year by malaria
3) Dutch Elm disease in trees
devastated the elm tree (host) populations in North America
parasite is an ascomycete fungus; vascular wilt disease
insect vectors are elm bark beetles that carry spores from one tree
to another
Multiple Hosts and Stages of Transmission
Definitive host the host in which the parasite reaches maturity
Intermediate harbors the host during some developmental phase
Dynamics of a parasite is tied to the population dynamics,
movement, and interaction of various hosts
Why would a parasite evolve to use more than one host to compete
its life cycle? Why would you need two hosts to complete your cycle
o Reasons for more complicated life cycle: a lot of
metamorphosis occurs in parasites, and need different
requirements in the stages; so need different types of hosts
to meet those requirements; need to maximize their fitness
Example: Meningeal worm
Two hosts, deer and snail
At different stages of life cycle, lives in different parts of the deer
itself
Goes through to its infective stage, deer accidentally consumes it,
goes into its stomach
After going into stomach, the larvae leave the snail and go through
the abdomen of the deer, then go into the spinal cord and travel to
the brain, where they mate and produce eggs
Then move through bloodstream into the lungs, causing deer to
cough and be reuptake into the stomach, exiting with feces
Hosts Respond to Parasitic Invasions
Behavioral defenses may help a host to avoid infection
1) grooming

 2) moving location
If parasite has infected host, defenses include
1) inflammatory response
2) internal cysts
Plant responses to parasites include
Cyst or scab formation in roots and fruits in response to bacterial
and fungal infections
Can sometimes provide them as food source to other animals like
birds
A second line of defense is the immune response
Antigen a toxin or other foreign substance that induces an
immune response in the body
Antibodies are produced
Parasites can circumvent the immune system
If animal is protein deficient, really struggle to get rid of parasites
Example: Western Fence Lizards can be infected by malaria
- infected males have fewer courtship and territorial behaviors,
altered correlations, etc
Effects on Host Survival and Reproduction
Sometimes parasites can change behavior of host organism
Killifish with a parasitic tematode flat worm infection display
abnormal behaviors such as surfacing and jerking
o Affects its brain
Frequency of conspicuous behavior was positively correlated to the
intensity of parasitism
Parasites may regulate host populations
The hosts needs to resist infection or eliminate or minimize tradeoffs

Virulence vs transmissibility
Virulence how deadly
Transmissibility how it can spread
Ebola = highly virulent, kills host so quickly it can kill itself out
Vertical transmission: the transmission of parasites from mother to
offspring just before or just after birth
Parasites with this mode of transmission are generally less virulent
Horizontal Transmission: contagious and passes on to other
organisms
Parasites may be density-dependent regulators of host
populations
Clumped distribution of parasites
For the most part, parasites are reserved in a few individuals until
the population becomes dense enough
Outbreaks occur when host density population is high
Parasitism is a symbiotic relationship
If the parasite remains in the host for an indefinite time, hosts
evolve defenses to reduce the parasites negative effect
Changes from parasitism to mutualism
Most probable examples of evolution from parasite to mutualist are
parasites with vertical transmission (mother to offspring)
Want to induce host to produce more offspring
Many mutualistic relationships are reciprocal exploitation rather than
cooperation
Benefits of the interaction depends on the environment
Trees and their mycorhizzal fungi: the trees benefit in nutrient-poor
soils but fungus appears to be more parasitic in nutrient rich soil
Mutualistic relationships
Obligate cannot survive or reproduce without each other

Facultative can survive without each other but do better with each
other
Specialist only one partner
Generalist diversity of partners
Corals are symbiotic with algae
- live in small cups with the skeleton of some animals in the reef
Warm water temperatures can result in coral bleaching
Corals will expel the algae (zooxanthellae) living in their tissues
causing the corals to turn completely white; coral will die and
fungus will grow on it
Lichen can survive in some of the most harsh environments on the
planet
have a fungus and an algae; symbiotic relationship
Non-symbiotic Mutualisms
Two organisms do not physically coexist
Pollination of flowers and seed dispersers
Generally facultative relationships
Oftentimes seeds will have to pass through digestive system of
animal to be able to break dormancy and be dispersed
Nitrogen fixing bacteria
Infection as well
Plant receives nitrogen from bacteria
The bacteria receive carbon and other resources from the plant
Too much fertilizer in fields will inhibit this process and make the
soil less fertile
II. Mutualism
Cleaning each other

Example: eel and crocodile, oxpecker feeds exclusively on ticks of large

mammals
Mutualism with a middle man
Example:
Truffle (Fruiting body) and a vole will go along and eat it
Then in the fecal pellets of the vole it will carry spores, these will
then land around some rootlets and colonize the roots of the tree
with mycorrhizae
Helps tree receive more nutrients and grow better
Mutualism can influence population dynamics
Mathematical models
Equilibrium above carrying capacity of both populations if they
existed alone
Ecological Issues
How do land-use changes affect the abundance and dispersal of
pathogens and parasites?
The impact of forest clearing on the spread of Lyme disease has
been well-documented
The number of reported cases in North America has dramatically
increased
About 300,000 people contract the disease annually
White tailed deer are the primary host species for adult blacklegged
ticks
Forest clearing and fragmentation have increased the population of
both deer and nice, resulting in an increase in the population of
ticks and the transmission rate of the Lyme disease bacterium
o
o