Effects of Continued Selfing on Hymenolepis nano (Cestoda)

Authors

Wallace A. Rodgers, Iowa State University
Martin J. Ulmer, Iowa State UniversityFollow

Document Type

Research

Abstract

The effects of selfing on Hymenolepis nana were investigated by establishing single infections in mice, thus ensuring self-fertilization. Selfing appears to increase the frequency of cysticercoid abnormalities. The proportion of eggs developing into cysticercoids in Tribolium confusum appears to decrease with continued selfing. Similarly, the proportion of cysticercoids developing into adults in mice decreases with continued selfing. Selfing causes no observable variation in the size of either adults or cysticercoids, nor does it cause changes in the frequency of appearance of certain morphological variants of the adult worm. The variant of reversal of genital pore appears to cause sterility of those proglottids demonstrating this modification. No selfed strain could be maintained beyond the fifth selfed generation. A population of twenty adult worms, the number employed in control mice, does not appear sufficient to prevent the decrease in viability caused by selfing. Cercomer damage is of little importance in the infectivity of the cysticercoid.

Publication Date

1962

Journal Title

Proceedings of the Iowa Academy of Science

Volume

69

Issue

1

First Page

557

Last Page

571

Copyright

©1962 Iowa Academy of Science, Inc.

Language

en

File Format

application/pdf

Recommended Citation

Rodgers, Wallace A. and Ulmer, Martin J. (1962) "Effects of Continued Selfing on Hymenolepis nano (Cestoda)," Proceedings of the Iowa Academy of Science, 69(1), 557-571.
Available at: https://scholarworks.uni.edu/pias/vol69/iss1/86