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Author Spotlight: Real-Time Monitoring of Parasite Burden and Host Response

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Missing links: testing the completeness of host-parasite checklists.

Robert Poulin¹, Anne A Besson¹, Mathieu B Morin¹

¹Department of Zoology,University of Otago,P.O. Box 56,Dunedin 9054,New Zealand.

|November 10, 2015

Summary

Most host-parasite checklists are incomplete, limiting their use in ecological parasitology. Researchers found few checklists accurately capture all regional host-parasite associations for comparative studies.

Keywords:

checklists connectance helminths interaction networks species accumulation curves vertebrates

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Area of Science:

Ecological parasitology
Biodiversity research
Conservation biology

Background:

Host-parasite checklists are crucial for ecological parasitology research.
These checklists are used in comparative studies of parasite species richness and host specificity.
The utility of checklists depends on their completeness in documenting regional host-parasite associations.

Purpose of the Study:

To assess the completeness of 25 metazoan parasite checklists for vertebrate hosts across various geographic regions.
To determine the reliability of these checklists as datasets for comparative ecological analyses.

Main Methods:

Network analysis: Assessed checklist connectance relative to network size.
Time-series analysis: Extrapolated total host-parasite associations based on discovery curves.
Correlation analysis: Examined the relationship between reported associations and time since first record.

Main Results:

No checklist performed well across all three completeness assessment methods.
Only three out of 25 checklists met the criteria for completeness in two out of three tests.
The majority of regional host-parasite checklists appear to be significantly incomplete.

Conclusions:

Most host-parasite checklists are not sufficiently complete for reliable use in comparative ecological studies.
The findings highlight limitations in current data synthesis for ecological parasitology.
Further efforts are needed to improve the completeness and reliability of host-parasite association data.