Parasite community structure in sympatric Bornean primates

Parasites are important components of ecosystems, influencing trophic networks, competitive interactions and biodiversity patterns. Nonetheless, we are not nearly close to disentangling their complex roles in natural systems. Southeast Asia falls within global areas targeted as most likely to source...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Frias, Liesbeth, Hasegawa, Hideo, Chua, Tock H., Sipangkui, Symphorosa, Stark, Danica J., Salgado-Lynn, Milena, Goossens, Benoit, Keuk, Kenneth, Okamoto, Munehiro, MacIntosh, Andrew J. J.
Other Authors: Asian School of the Environment
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: 2022
Subjects:
Online Access:https://hdl.handle.net/10356/161360
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Institution: Nanyang Technological University
Language: English
id sg-ntu-dr.10356-161360
record_format dspace
spelling sg-ntu-dr.10356-1613602023-02-28T16:41:45Z Parasite community structure in sympatric Bornean primates Frias, Liesbeth Hasegawa, Hideo Chua, Tock H. Sipangkui, Symphorosa Stark, Danica J. Salgado-Lynn, Milena Goossens, Benoit Keuk, Kenneth Okamoto, Munehiro MacIntosh, Andrew J. J. Asian School of the Environment Science::Biological sciences::Ecology Helminths Biodiversity Parasites are important components of ecosystems, influencing trophic networks, competitive interactions and biodiversity patterns. Nonetheless, we are not nearly close to disentangling their complex roles in natural systems. Southeast Asia falls within global areas targeted as most likely to source parasites with zoonotic potential, where high rates of land conversion and fragmentation have altered the circulation of wildlife species and their parasites, potentially resulting in altered host-parasite systems. Although the overall biodiversity in the region predicts equally high, or even higher, parasite diversity, we know surprisingly little about wild primate parasites, even though this constitutes the first step towards a more comprehensive understanding of parasite transmission processes. Here, we characterise the gastrointestinal helminth parasite assemblages of a community of Bornean primates living along the Kinabatangan floodplain in Sabah (Malaysian Borneo), including two species endemic to the island. Through parasitological analyses, and by using several measures of parasite infection as proxies for parasite diversity and distribution, we show that (i) most parasite taxonomic groups are not limited to a single host, suggesting a greater flexibility for habitat disturbance, (ii) parasite infracommunities of nocturnal primates differ from their diurnal counterparts, reflecting both phylogenetic and ecological constraints, and (iii) soil-transmitted helminths such as whipworm, threadworm and nodule worm are widespread across the primate community. This study also provides new parasite records for southern pig-tailed macaques (Macaca nemestrina), silvered langurs (Trachypithecus cristatus) and Western tarsiers (Cephalopachus bancanus) in the wild, while adding to the limited records for the other primate species in the community. Given the information gap regarding primate-parasite associations in the region, the information presented here should prove relevant for future studies of parasite biodiversity and infectious disease ecology in Asia and elsewhere. Published version This study was financially supported by grants from Kyoto University, Japan through its Step-Up program (AM) and by the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science (#24770232 and #16H06181 to AM, and #15H04283 to MO). LF was supported by the Japan Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT) through a Monbukagakusho schol- arship (#140411), by the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science through a JSPS-DC2 fellowship and Grant-in-Aid (#446), and by the Leading Graduate Program in Primatology and Wildlife Science (PWS) of Kyoto University (JSPS-U04). 2022-08-29T06:35:20Z 2022-08-29T06:35:20Z 2021 Journal Article Frias, L., Hasegawa, H., Chua, T. H., Sipangkui, S., Stark, D. J., Salgado-Lynn, M., Goossens, B., Keuk, K., Okamoto, M. & MacIntosh, A. J. J. (2021). Parasite community structure in sympatric Bornean primates. International Journal for Parasitology, 51(11), 925-933. https://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ijpara.2021.03.003 0020-7519 https://hdl.handle.net/10356/161360 10.1016/j.ijpara.2021.03.003 33862059 2-s2.0-85105033545 11 51 925 933 en International Journal for Parasitology © 2021 The Author(s). Published by Elsevier Ltd on behalf of Australian Society for Parasitology. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/). application/pdf
institution Nanyang Technological University
building NTU Library
continent Asia
country Singapore
Singapore
content_provider NTU Library
collection DR-NTU
language English
topic Science::Biological sciences::Ecology
Helminths
Biodiversity
spellingShingle Science::Biological sciences::Ecology
Helminths
Biodiversity
Frias, Liesbeth
Hasegawa, Hideo
Chua, Tock H.
Sipangkui, Symphorosa
Stark, Danica J.
Salgado-Lynn, Milena
Goossens, Benoit
Keuk, Kenneth
Okamoto, Munehiro
MacIntosh, Andrew J. J.
Parasite community structure in sympatric Bornean primates
description Parasites are important components of ecosystems, influencing trophic networks, competitive interactions and biodiversity patterns. Nonetheless, we are not nearly close to disentangling their complex roles in natural systems. Southeast Asia falls within global areas targeted as most likely to source parasites with zoonotic potential, where high rates of land conversion and fragmentation have altered the circulation of wildlife species and their parasites, potentially resulting in altered host-parasite systems. Although the overall biodiversity in the region predicts equally high, or even higher, parasite diversity, we know surprisingly little about wild primate parasites, even though this constitutes the first step towards a more comprehensive understanding of parasite transmission processes. Here, we characterise the gastrointestinal helminth parasite assemblages of a community of Bornean primates living along the Kinabatangan floodplain in Sabah (Malaysian Borneo), including two species endemic to the island. Through parasitological analyses, and by using several measures of parasite infection as proxies for parasite diversity and distribution, we show that (i) most parasite taxonomic groups are not limited to a single host, suggesting a greater flexibility for habitat disturbance, (ii) parasite infracommunities of nocturnal primates differ from their diurnal counterparts, reflecting both phylogenetic and ecological constraints, and (iii) soil-transmitted helminths such as whipworm, threadworm and nodule worm are widespread across the primate community. This study also provides new parasite records for southern pig-tailed macaques (Macaca nemestrina), silvered langurs (Trachypithecus cristatus) and Western tarsiers (Cephalopachus bancanus) in the wild, while adding to the limited records for the other primate species in the community. Given the information gap regarding primate-parasite associations in the region, the information presented here should prove relevant for future studies of parasite biodiversity and infectious disease ecology in Asia and elsewhere.
author2 Asian School of the Environment
author_facet Asian School of the Environment
Frias, Liesbeth
Hasegawa, Hideo
Chua, Tock H.
Sipangkui, Symphorosa
Stark, Danica J.
Salgado-Lynn, Milena
Goossens, Benoit
Keuk, Kenneth
Okamoto, Munehiro
MacIntosh, Andrew J. J.
format Article
author Frias, Liesbeth
Hasegawa, Hideo
Chua, Tock H.
Sipangkui, Symphorosa
Stark, Danica J.
Salgado-Lynn, Milena
Goossens, Benoit
Keuk, Kenneth
Okamoto, Munehiro
MacIntosh, Andrew J. J.
author_sort Frias, Liesbeth
title Parasite community structure in sympatric Bornean primates
title_short Parasite community structure in sympatric Bornean primates
title_full Parasite community structure in sympatric Bornean primates
title_fullStr Parasite community structure in sympatric Bornean primates
title_full_unstemmed Parasite community structure in sympatric Bornean primates
title_sort parasite community structure in sympatric bornean primates
publishDate 2022
url https://hdl.handle.net/10356/161360
_version_ 1759856826124337152