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Updated: Sep 25, 2026

QTL Mapping and CRISPR/Cas9 Editing to Identify a Drug Resistance Gene in Toxoplasma gondii
Published on: June 22, 2017
Spatial parasite transmission, drug resistance, and the spread of rare genes
S J Cornell1, V S Isham, G Smith
1Department of Zoology, University of Cambridge, Downing Street, Cambridge CB2 3EJ, United Kingdom. cornell@zoo.cam.ac.uk
Abstract:
The transmission of many parasitic worms involves aggregated movement between hosts of "packets" of infectious larvae. We use a generic metapopulation model to show that this aggregation naturally promotes the preferential spread of rare recessive genes, compared with the expectations of traditional nonspatial models. A more biologically realistic model also demonstrates that this effect could explain the rapid observed spread of recessive or weakly dominant drug-resistant genotypes in nematode parasites of sheep. This promotion of a recessive trait arises from a novel mechanism of inbreeding arising from the metapopulation dynamics of transmission.
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