From fungi to flies, some parasitic species have figured out how to control their host's behavior to get what they need. See what happens when bugs go really bad
Why would a caterpillar protect wasp cocoons from invaders? The wasps (of the genus Glyptapanteles ) are controlling the caterpillar. "Just before the wasp [larva] emerges from the caterpillar, it produces a toxin that causes the caterpillar to be a bodyguard" for the wasp larvae, explains David Hughes , a research fellow at the University of Exeter....[More]
A CATERPILLAR BODYGUARD
Why would a caterpillar protect wasp cocoons from invaders? The wasps (of the genus Glyptapanteles) are controlling the caterpillar. "Just before the wasp [larva] emerges from the caterpillar, it produces a toxin that causes the caterpillar to be a bodyguard" for the wasp larvae, explains David Hughes, a research fellow at the University of Exeter. "It doesn't allow the caterpillar to do all the other normal caterpillar stuff, like walk away" to escape, he adds.
Researchers are still not sure how the caterpillar is engaged in this final duty. "It's a behavior that's induced by a parasite that is not even in the host anymore," says Edward Levri, an associate professor of biology at The Pennsylvania State University. Other caterpillars have been forced to create cocoons for parasitic wasp larvae that emerge from them, he adds. "The caterpillar is almost dead, and then its last goal in life is to create a cocoonlike house" for the vulnerable wasp larvae. As he points out, "if [the larvae] aren't covered up by the web, another parasitoid will inject eggs into them," initiating another meta-level of parasitism.
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WIKIMEDIA COMMONS/JOSE LINO-NETO
A COCKROACH PAWN
In a well-documented example of external parasite control, an emerald cockroach wasp ( Ampulex compressa ) enslaves a much larger cockroach ( Periplaneta americana )....[More]
A COCKROACH PAWN
In a well-documented example of external parasite control, an emerald cockroach wasp (Ampulex compressa) enslaves a much larger cockroach (Periplaneta americana). The wasp injects a neurotoxin into the cockroach's brain. This toxin kills off the roach's ability to control its own movement but doesn't paralyze it entirely. The wasp is then able to grasp the roach's antenna and lead it into a nest before laying an egg in the live cockroach's body.
Permanently incapacitated, the cockroach is unable to escape and is eaten from the inside by the growing wasp larva.
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FREDERIC LIBERSAT
CRICKET-ICIDE
Crickets can't swim, but the harrowing hairworm ( Spinochordodes tellinii ) doesn't care about that detail. After growing inside of a cricket's body and feasting on its insides, the hairworm will inexplicably compel the cricket to throw itself into a body of water , where the ruthless body snatcher can emerge and enter the aquatic phase of its life cycle....[More]
CRICKET-ICIDE
Crickets can't swim, but the harrowing hairworm (Spinochordodes tellinii) doesn't care about that detail. After growing inside of a cricket's body and feasting on its insides, the hairworm will inexplicably compel the cricket to throw itself into a body of water, where the ruthless body snatcher can emerge and enter the aquatic phase of its life cycle.
"It was amazing to see hundreds of crickets at night totally under the control of the parasite inside and jumping into the water," says Frederic Thomas, a scientist at the Genetics and Evolution of Infectious Diseases research group in Montpellier, France, who described the phenomenon in the Journal of Evolutionary Biology.
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WIKIMEDIA COMMONS/BILDSPENDE VON D. ANDREAS SCHMIDT-RHAESA
A FUNGUS AMONG US
Ants infected with a spooky breed of fungus ( Ophiocordyceps unilateralis ) have been shown to march to that parasite's orders. Usually tropical treetop-dwellers, these infected Camponotus leonardi ants will climb down to low leaves that are just in the right spot for the fungus to thrive (at very specific orientation, temperature and height), then chomp onto a leaf vein with a so-called "death grip"....[More]
A FUNGUS AMONG US
Ants infected with a spooky breed of fungus (Ophiocordyceps unilateralis) have been shown to march to that parasite's orders. Usually tropical treetop-dwellers, these infected Camponotus leonardi ants will climb down to low leaves that are just in the right spot for the fungus to thrive (at very specific orientation, temperature and height), then chomp onto a leaf vein with a so-called "death grip".
The ant then dies as its innards are metabolized by the fungus inside. Eventually, the invader sprouts from the ant's body and releases spores that drift to the ground, creating a silent circle of certain death for any other ant that passes through it.
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DAVID HUGHES
A BERRY SCARY ANT
Ants do their best to avoid being snatched up as snacks. Their dark coloring can help them blend into their surroundings and prevent would-be predators from spotting individual targets in a nest....[More]
A BERRY SCARY ANT
Ants do their best to avoid being snatched up as snacks. Their dark coloring can help them blend into their surroundings and prevent would-be predators from spotting individual targets in a nest. For a parasite that seeks to find its way back into a bird host, however, this arrangement needed some alteration.
The nematode parasite (Myrmeconema neotropicum) manages to turn Cephalotes atratus ants' gasters (enlarged part of the abdomen) the color of local red berries—the kind that birds eat—and also impel the false berry-baring hosts to venture away from the colony, making them easier prey. When the exposed victim is snatched up by a bird, the latter is infected with the parasite. After the bird digests its tainted treat, it passes along the parasite passenger in its droppings, which stand waiting to infect other unsuspecting ants.
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STEVE YANOVIAK
CAT AND MOUSE
A parasite that lives to change mouse behavior may also be altering the way humans act. The parasitic protozoa Toxoplasma gondii thrives by cycling through feline and rodent hosts....[More]
CAT AND MOUSE
A parasite that lives to change mouse behavior may also be altering the way humans act. The parasitic protozoa Toxoplasma gondii thrives by cycling through feline and rodent hosts. When it infects mice, the brain-dwelling parasite makes them more daring and, in particular, less afraid of the scent of cats (so it can get passed back to the feline hosts when they eat the infected, emboldened rodents).
The chemical changes brought on by the parasite appear to have some of the same effects on humans, who can be infected by ingesting parasite eggs from cat feces. Research by Kevin Lafferty, a research ecologist with the U.S. Geological Survey, has found that the parasite can cause women to act more moralistically, and men less so. And "when looking at human societies, those traits correlated pretty well with the prevalence of T. gondii infections," Levri says. Other research has shown a higher incidence of risky behavior in people who are infected.
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ISTOCKPHOTO/SHIFFTI
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5. NebulousIntent
in reply to brsecu04:09 PM 10/30/09
Cat feces decomposes quickly and can be inhaled. There are a lot of different and equally grotesque viruses and parasites in that dust. That's one of the reasons why pregnant women aren't supposed to clean the cat box. At least, that's the excuse my roommate always gave...
Who ever thought a sand box in the back yard was a good idea,but there they are.Ring worm and others are alive and well,and its not the cats that got us to build these things?
Sci Am published an article a few years ago about the bacterium toxoplasma, which infects cats and can cause problems for pregnant human mothers. Most interesting is the fact that toxoplasma causes rodents to lose their fear of felines, so they become easy prey for cats. The rodents pick up toxoplasma from feline droppings, thereby completing the circle for the parasite.
Quite a scary thought to know that such things exist, and even more scary that even scientists have not figured out all the facts yet, much less be in a position to control or do anything about it! Isn't this the information stone age?
10. freakyguy6190
in reply to brsecu11:30 PM 10/31/09
If u didn't know cat like/have a habit to smell their feces and when that cat come in contact with human(who keeps cats as pets) u know it is more likely to infect human, I really doubt anyone eat cat feces, seriously, just need to think in logical way.
11. freakyguy6190
in reply to freakyguy619011:35 PM 10/31/09
Scientist haven't figured out many things LOL, if they do not know it simply do not exits, recently I read from(i believe a magazine on human behavior) that there is no God, God is just a Quack because there is no way to know if its real or not. We humans believe in God because we just want to go to better place and to create fear in bad people and stop good people to turning bad.
i will go and get cat ,it might make my wife more berable to live with as she has no moral compunction to be nice to me or any one else, and if it makes me less moral i will be able abandon my vows and go astray wityhout any guilt. did the stepford wifes keep cats?
I read a report several years ago about a parasite that caused fish to swim upside-down near the surface, flashing their silvery-white bellies, which attracted the eagles or hawks that ate the fish. The raptors then hosted the parasites. If I recall it, the fish ingested the raptors' excrement, completing the cycle. I can't find the article now.
We already have plenty of human parasites. They use the government to take from those who produce. Once the host agrees to give a share of production to the parasite, the parasite demands more, until finally the host perishes and the parasite is forced to find another host.
In the U.S, we generally call these parasites democrats.
The worst kind of parasite is a journalist. He just publishes an an article in one the medium he works for and all those who reads it or listens to it starts believing that that's true. And keep reading or listening him so he can keep his job. Another kind of parasite who is very harmful to humans is a religious cleric. Does anybody wonder why they have a living without working at all?
Yoosdef, are so very close to the factual information. A parasite is the original hacker and has gotten itself into the build of the human and other animals, or in the dna it has set itself to be built in the womb and infused into the host and can appear like simple brain tissue. It is more a leader of the bacteria world and is chemical, plauges and such. It uses the human communications to spread its instructions to the parasites in other people and also uses the same books, to tell the human it’s so called place. You’ll find many illogical statements in religions and it is wrapped around instructions of care or disorder of the host for the parasite to do. Or hybridization. It puts its same instructions in childrens cartoons for the ones who are new and anywhere that is communicable, but it’s system of worship is for its own faster regeneration and can peruse humans to further its goals. Both being the voices of evil and good more known as schizophrenia, but it hides and indirect communication is chemical and direct is literally auditory hallucinations. If it can’t get other hosts to cause trauma for the younger people it will do it itself within the mind. It tries to take the place as the natural instincts of all beings to be the only ones with foresight into the future and distracts the human from using it’s own instincts and they never run from earthquakes or tsunamis as animals do. It has pulled the life of its’ host into itself and removing it will cause the death of the host, but those that are used in its show are more a carrier and it gives up its life to further its whole aims. For the human who are eaiser hacked, sexual disorders to breed in the traits where the parasite is stronger and host weaker. But now it is almost time for the reverse, and “the voices”, will be the television, radio, and the computer extension of the brain, they are already making it past the inflammatory responses and immune system but their attacks must be used wisely lest the hosts immune system attack them. These are the divisions it uses to incite them against one another of their beliefs and world views and typic mispelling as pure accidental. Though it may seem smart, it has no physical survival and blind men read the bumps on the log, its knowledge is a consistent furthering of what the human that is used as its instrument to see the world around it is the one now growing weaker of that the parasite, lord of the flies and creator of plauges, mostly an exaggeration to appear larger, object may appear closer than they are behind you. The balance system is almost fulfilled now, hence the parasite will be the “power” of the future, one with a negative terminal and one with a positive terminal and it will charge the houses and generate electricity; but what of its future, 11 one on the high end and one on the low end, it must live in its own delusion online and will be removed one day, and stuffed into the commodity boxes for resale, and 10 will be forbidden access to the human brain system, what of the words to be a more structered solidification of atomic and smaller worlds as they harden, and even down to yatto, where the buffalo roams and the seminole blows, they will all join in…
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36 Comments
Add CommentAw you ended it on the part I was afraid of while reading the entire time: what if there's ones that affect us?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisCreepy.
It is call marraige!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"have some of the same effects on humans, who can be infected by ingesting parasite eggs from cat feces"
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisUhhhhh....... What?
I would venture to guess that people who eat cat feces already have problems with controlling themselves!
Great story for Halloween! Real science is better than fiction any day.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisCat feces decomposes quickly and can be inhaled. There are a lot of different and equally grotesque viruses and parasites in that dust. That's one of the reasons why pregnant women aren't supposed to clean the cat box. At least, that's the excuse my roommate always gave...
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWho ever thought a sand box in the back yard was a good idea,but there they are.Ring worm and others are alive and well,and its not the cats that got us to build these things?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisSci Am published an article a few years ago about the bacterium toxoplasma, which infects cats and can cause problems for pregnant human mothers. Most interesting is the fact that toxoplasma causes rodents to lose their fear of felines, so they become easy prey for cats. The rodents pick up toxoplasma from feline droppings, thereby completing the circle for the parasite.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThats awesome...cats controlling our behavior so we build larger litter boxes...lol
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisQuite a scary thought to know that such things exist, and even more scary that even scientists have not figured out all the facts yet, much less be in a position to control or do anything about it! Isn't this the information stone age?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIf u didn't know cat like/have a habit to smell their feces and when that cat come in contact with human(who keeps cats as pets) u know it is more likely to infect human, I really doubt anyone eat cat feces, seriously, just need to think in logical way.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisScientist haven't figured out many things LOL, if they do not know it simply do not exits, recently I read from(i believe a magazine on human behavior) that there is no God, God is just a Quack because there is no way to know if its real or not. We humans believe in God because we just want to go to better place and to create fear in bad people and stop good people to turning bad.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAt least thats what I read/understood
Dan Dennett has been talking about brain manipulating parasites for years. Religion falls into this category.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisso does gossip
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI wonder if natural drugs such as marijuana, peyote, and mushrooms could be classified as zombifying parasites.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisi will go and get cat ,it might make my wife more berable to live with as she has no moral compunction to be nice to me or any one else, and if it makes me less moral i will be able abandon my vows and go astray wityhout any guilt. did the
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisstepford wifes keep cats?
I read a report several years ago about a parasite that caused fish to swim upside-down near the surface, flashing their silvery-white bellies, which attracted the eagles or hawks that ate the fish. The raptors then hosted the parasites. If I recall it, the fish ingested the raptors' excrement, completing the cycle. I can't find the article now.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisPerfect article for Hallowe'en!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisOn another note, who let "by in large" slip by? Editors, please, it's "by and large."
Maui manuscript medic
Dawkin's speculates that this could be an explanation for religion.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisA parasite attacking the human brain.
wow i never knew that
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisLooks cool and creepy but how is it a zombie creature thingamobob
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisboo i am a vampire
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thiswierd i think so bye
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisSlide show totally creeped me out. Article also attracted a bunch of creepy commenters. Maybe the article is a parasite.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWe already have plenty of human parasites. They use the government to take from those who produce. Once the host agrees to give a share of production to the parasite, the parasite demands more, until finally the host perishes and the parasite is forced to find another host.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIn the U.S, we generally call these parasites democrats.
I wish stupidity could be cured by killing a parasit.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe worst kind of parasite is a journalist. He just publishes an an article in one the medium he works for and all those who reads it or listens to it starts believing that that's true. And keep reading or listening him so he can keep his job. Another kind of parasite who is very harmful to humans is a religious cleric. Does anybody wonder why they have a living without working at all?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisExcellent insight.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisMaybe we humas ARE the parasite. The planet Earth is our host we use to expand as a species... Off to Mars!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisim am terrified!!! please tell me they do not infect humans!!!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI'm TERRIFIED!!! Please tell me that they don't infect humans!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisim sure they dont
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisYoosdef, are so very close to the factual information. A parasite is the original hacker and has gotten itself into the build of the human and other animals, or in the dna it has set itself to be built in the womb and infused into the host and can appear like simple brain tissue. It is more a leader of the bacteria world and is chemical, plauges and such. It uses the human communications to spread its instructions to the parasites in other people and also uses the same books, to tell the human it’s so called place. You’ll find many illogical statements in religions and it is wrapped around instructions of care or disorder of the host for the parasite to do. Or hybridization. It puts its same instructions in childrens cartoons for the ones who are new and anywhere that is communicable, but it’s system of worship is for its own faster regeneration and can peruse humans to further its goals. Both being the voices of evil and good more known as schizophrenia, but it hides and indirect communication is chemical and direct is literally auditory hallucinations. If it can’t get other hosts to cause trauma for the younger people it will do it itself within the mind. It tries to take the place as the natural instincts of all beings to be the only ones with foresight into the future and distracts the human from using it’s own instincts and they never run from earthquakes or tsunamis as animals do. It has pulled the life of its’ host into itself and removing it will cause the death of the host, but those that are used in its show are more a carrier and it gives up its life to further its whole aims. For the human who are eaiser hacked, sexual disorders to breed in the traits where the parasite is stronger and host weaker. But now it is almost time for the reverse, and “the voices”, will be the television, radio, and the computer extension of the brain, they are already making it past the inflammatory responses and immune system but their attacks must be used wisely lest the hosts immune system attack them. These are the divisions it uses to incite them against one another of their beliefs and world views and typic mispelling as pure accidental. Though it may seem smart, it has no physical survival and blind men read the bumps on the log, its knowledge is a consistent furthering of what the human that is used as its instrument to see the world around it is the one now growing weaker of that the parasite, lord of the flies and creator of plauges, mostly an exaggeration to appear larger, object may appear closer than they are behind you. The balance system is almost fulfilled now, hence the parasite will be the “power” of the future, one with a negative terminal and one with a positive terminal and it will charge the houses and generate electricity; but what of its future, 11 one on the high end and one on the low end, it must live in its own delusion online and will be removed one day, and stuffed into the commodity boxes for resale, and 10 will be forbidden access to the human brain system, what of the words to be a more structered solidification of atomic and smaller worlds as they harden, and even down to yatto, where the buffalo roams and the seminole blows, they will all join in…
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisToxoplasma gondii is a parasitic protozoa. Check it out, fascinating stuff, said to desensitize rats, an intermediate host, to cats, its primary host.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisYou wonder if this kind of thing can affect humans?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisGoogle "toxoplasmosis, world cup"
Let me guess; You think Ann Coulter is brilliant with great political insight.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThat's wrong. We call the parasitic humans "priests".
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this