introduction: the present study aimed to investigate the microbial quality of the produced vermicomposts and compare them with the existing standards. methods: this experimental study was conducted as a pilot-scale one, in the laboratory school. some perishable domestic waste were mixed in a reactor, including food waste, vegetables and fruits, cow manure and sludge of wastewater treatment plan...

BACKGROUND Schistosoma mansoni and Schistosoma japonicum are the most frequent causative agents of human intestinal schistosomiasis. Approximately 200 million people in the world are infected with schistosomes. Diagnosis of schistosomiasis is often difficult. High percentages of low level infections are missed in routine fecal smear analysis and current diagnostic methodologies are inadequate t...

Baylisascaris procyonis roundworms, a parasite of raccoons, can infect humans, sometimes fatally. Parasite eggs can remain viable in raccoon latrines for years. To develop a management technique for parasite eggs, we tested anthelmintic baiting. The prevalence of eggs decreased at latrines, and larval infections decreased among intermediate hosts, indicating that baiting is effective.

Abstract Egg rejection is an effective and widespread antiparasitic defense to eliminate foreign eggs from the nests of hosts brood parasitic birds. Several lines observational critical experimental evidence support a role for learning by in recognition versus own eggs; specifically, individual that have had prior or current experience with parasitism are more likely reject eggs. Here we confir...

The hosts of brood parasitic birds are under strong selection pressure to recognize and remove foreign eggs from their nests, but parasite eggs may be too large to be grasped whole and too strong to be readily pierced by the host's bill. Such operating constraints on egg removal are proposed to force some hosts to accept parasite eggs, as the costs of deserting parasitized clutches can outweigh...

Host-mediated responses and parasite density-dependent processes can have a major influence on the growth and fecundity of parasitic nematodes. However, host characteristics and parasite intensity consistently change during the course of an infection and these could affect worm length and number of eggs in a non-constant way. We used a free-living population of rabbits naturally infected with T...

Infectious diseases caused by soil-transmitted helminths (STHs) are important diseases of humans, which affect about one third of the world’s population. Examination of soil can be used to estimate the risk of STH infection in humans. We carried out this survey to clarify the current status of soil contamination by parasite eggs and to assess the risk of STH infection. During survey periods, we...

In the present study, the abdominal contents of 10 mummies from beneath the Dominican Church of the Holy Spirit in Vilnius, Lithuania, were examined for the presence of helminth parasites using standard archaeoparasitological techniques. Of the mummies examined, only one individual presented with evidence of parasitism. This individual was infected with both Trichuris trichiura and Ascaris lumb...

Hosts of cuckoos have evolved defences allowing them to discriminate and reject parasite eggs. Mechanisms of discrimination are mostly visually mediated, and have been studied using approaches that do not account for what the receiver (i.e. host) actually can discriminate. Here, for the first time we apply a perceptual model of colour discrimination to study behavioural responses to natural var...