Size-asymmetric competition among snails disrupts production of human-infectious Schistosoma mansoni cercariae.

ABSTRACT: Parasites can harm hosts and influence populations, communities, and ecosystems. However, parasites are reciprocally affected by population- and community-level dynamics. Understanding feedbacks between infection dynamics and larger-scale epidemiological and ecological processes could improve predictions and reveal novel control methods. We evaluated how exploitative resource competition among hosts, a fundamental aspect of population biology, influences within-host infection dynamics of the widespread human parasite Schistosoma mansoni in its intermediate host, Biomphalaria glabrata. We added size-dependent consumption of shared resources to a parameterized bioenergetics model to predict a priori the growth, parasite production, and survival of an infected focal host coexisting with an un

SUBMITTER: Civitello DJ 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC8249335 | biostudies-literature | 2021 Jul

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature