Enterobius vermicularis: ancient DNA from North and South American human coprolites.

SL1 RNA gene recovery from Enterobius vermicularis ancient DNA in pre-Columbian human coprolites.

Enterobius vermicularis, pinworm, is one of the most common helminths worldwide, infecting nearly a billion people at all socio-economic levels. In prehistoric populations the paleoparasitological findings show a pinworm homogeneous distribution among hunter-gatherers in North America, intensified with the advent of agriculture. This same increase also occurred in the transition from nomad hunt...

Enterobius vermicularis: Ancient DNA from North and South American Coprolites

Temporal and Spatial Distribution of Enterobius vermicularis (Nematoda: Oxyuridae) in the Prehistoric Americas

Investigations of Enterobius sp. infection in prehistory have produced a body of data that can be used to evaluate the geographic distribution of infection through time in the Americas. Regional variations in prevalence are evident. In North America, 119 pinworm positive samples were found in 1,112 samples from 28 sites with a prevalence of 10.7%. Almost all of the positive samples came from ag...

Parasitism of prehistoric humans and companion animals from Antelope Cave, Mojave County, northwest Arizona.

Previously, we reported a tick recovered from Antelope Cave in extreme northwest Arizona. Further analyses of coprolites from Antelope Cave revealed additional parasitological data from coprolites of both human and canid origin. A second tick was found. This site is the only archaeological locality where ticks have been recovered. We also discovered an acanthocephalan in association with Entero...

Molecular paleoparasitological diagnosis of Ascaris sp. from coprolites: new scenery of ascariasis in pre-Columbian South America times

Paleoparasitological studies using microscopy showed that Ascaris and Trichuris trichiura are the human intestinal parasites most found in archaeological sites. However, in pre-Columbian South American archaeological sites, Ascaris is rare. In this work we standardized a molecular methodology for Ascaris diagnosis directly from ancient DNA retrieved from coprolites. Using cythochrome b gene (14...