Nematomorph News

During the month of March, the Hairworm Biodiversity team has received a large number of hairworm reports from the state of California. Reports have come from southern (San Diego) to northern (Mendocino) parts of the state. Many of these Citizen Scientists have sent samples to our team for additional study. This kind of data is invaluable to us, since it is nearly impossible to conduct year-round monitoring throughout continents. Thanks to all who have shared their findings, and we would be happy if you joined us as a Citizen Scientist and told us about any finds you may make.

Alyssa Begay along with several members of the University of New Mexico Opportunities for Undergraduates (UnO) program presented their student research projects to high school students at Jemez Pueblo, in Western New Mexico. Alyssa met with 3 classes (>50 students) taught by Mr. Ron Kruege, and taught students about hairworms. Her talk was very well received and recruited these students to keep an eye out for these curious creatures. She also talked about how the undergraduate experiences in research opened up new perspectives and broadened her future horizon.

November 2010: Biodiversity Survey members send live worms to nursing program classroom, providing an experience "students will not soon forget".

In October, we received a plea from Karen, a student at Oklahoma Baptist University, who was tasked to give a 30 minute presentation on how hairworms impact human beings. The plea was for live worms to be used as a teaching tool to draw students into a hands-on learning experience. Karen started the presentation by putting a Gordian knot of worms into a large fish bowl. Students asked "Those aren't real, are they?" Karen writes that "I am sure my presentation is one that the students will not soon forget." Rather than just talking about the impact of hairworms on humans, I think that Karen made and impact on humans through hairworms. Way to go Karen!!!

The National Science Foundation (NSF) has awarded the Hairworm Biodiversity Survey Team a grant of $578,176 to study the diversity and systematics of hairworms in the Americas. The grant is entitled: "Unraveling a Gordian knot: Biodiversity of Gordian worms, phylum Nematomorpha, in the New World". The grant provides funding for Ben Hanelt, Matt Bolek , and Andreas-Schmidt-Rhaesa. The project will run from 1 August 2010 to 31 July 2013. To find out more, please follow this or this link.

Matt Bolek presented information on the biodiversity of hairworms at the 12th meeting of the International Congress of Parasitologists (ICoPa) in Melbourne Australia. His talk was presented in a biodiversity seminar and was entitled: Unravelling a Gordian knot: Biodiversity of Gordian worms, phylum Nematomorpha (click here for the abstract).

At the 2010 annual meeting of the American Society of Parasitologists in Colorado Springs, Colorado, Matt Bolek presented a talk on parasites in the Teacher Education Workshop entitled: The cool, the bad, and the ugly. The highlight of his talk was this video, which caused educators and professional parasitologists alike to squirm in their seats.

Matt Bolek presented the species description of a new hairworm species, Chordodes janovyi at the 62nd Annual Midwestern Conference of Parasitologists in Macomb, Illinois. This species has been named in honor of Dr. John Janovy Jr., parasitologist, educator, gentleman. The talk was entitled: Redescription of the African Chordodes albibarbatus Montgomery 1898, and description of a new species of Chordodes (Gordiida, Nematomorpha) and its non-adult stages from Cameroon, Africa (click here for the abstract).

At the 43rd annual meeting of the Southwestern Association of Parasitologists, in Lake Texoma, Oklahoma, Erin Rogers, an undergraduate student in Matt Bolek's lab at Oklahoma State University, presented a poster entitled: Suspending life cycle in the cold: Survival of larval and cyst stages of gordiids (Nematomorpha) to freezing (click here for the abstract)

Andreas Schmidt-Rhaesa collaborated with colleagues from countries, from which no or only very rare information of the nematomorph fauna were known. These are: Estonia, Georgia, Spain, Turkey and Serbia. In each case, motivated local researchers are in close collaboration with Andreas. The outcomes are new records and new species.

On June 3, Andreas Schmidt-Rhaesa gave a talk in the Evolutionary Biology Seminar at the University Bielefeld, Germany entitled: “Manipulation of hosts by parasites and possible consequences for the evolution of the hosts. Example: horsehair worms (Nematomorpha)“.

The Department of Zoology at the Oklahoma State University hosted a department seminar by Ben Hanelt entitled: “Untying a Gordian knot: The biology of freshwater nematomorphs”. Ben was hosted by Matt and Melissa Bolek.

Ben Hanelt spent six weeks in the field near Kisumu Kenya working on an NIH-funded schistosome project. During this time, Ben was able collect snails infected with two different gordiid cysts. Upon return to the laboratory, he and Matt Bolek infected crickets with these snails. Adult worms recovered from the crickets revealed the two cyst types to represent two previously unknown gordiid species.

At the 83rd Annual Meeting of the American Society of Parasitologists (ASP) in Arlington Texas, Whitney Doerfert presented an oral presentation entitled: The Chosen Frozen: Cold-Tolerance and Survival of Paragordius varius (Nematomorpha:Gordiida) Larvae. Whitney is an undergraduate researcher at the University of New Mexico, in Ben Hanelt's lab. To present this work, Whitney was awarded (by ASP) with a prestigious Marc Dresden Travel Grant.
To read the abstract (as a pdf), click here and look for abstract #13.

An invitation to investigate nematomorphs around Lake Biwa in Southern Japan led to an ongoing collaboration of Andreas Schmidt-Rhaesa with several Japanese colleagues, during which one new species could be described and two species were determined that were unknown to Japan.
To see an abstract of work resulting from this collaboration, click here.

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