Science, Space and Technology News 2024
produces non-reproductive soldiers which have much larger mouths than their reproductively capable colony-mates . The soldiers use their mouths to defend the colony by producing powerful blasts of suction to kill their enemies . Credit: Dan Metz
Unlike bees and termites, the colonies of this species of flatworm are not underground or in a tree hollow, but inside the body of a live snail. The parasites don’t kill the snail, but instead siphon off nutrients for years as they pump out free-swimming clones that search for fish, the flatworms’ next host in their complex life cycle.
“These worms want to guard their house,” said Dan Metz, the paper’s lead author and a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln who conducted this study during his PhD at Scripps. “Another parasite infecting their snail is like someone coming into your home and threatening your family. You’ll do what you can to protect your family, and so will these worms.”
First, all the soldiers lacked any reproductive organs, while even the most immature reproductive worms – including unborn ones still inside their parent – had detectable reproductive structures. Second, the researchers did not encounter any worms that had body proportions that appeared to bridge the physical gap between soldiers and the reproductive worms.
Singapore Latest News, Singapore Headlines
Similar News:You can also read news stories similar to this one that we have collected from other news sources.
Dental Hygienist's Unexpected Discovery Leads to Life-Saving Diagnosis for Woman (Exclusive)In May, Christine Lee was diagnosed with B non-Hodgkin's lymphoma for the second time after her dental hygienist found a lump in her mouth.
Read more »
Tucson Family's Sewer Surprise Leads to Unexpected DiscoveryJoel Foster is a Multimedia Journalist at KGUN9.
Read more »
Discovery Plus Free Trial 2022: Amazon Prime Video Discovery+ PromoCatch us watching HGTV 24/7 from now on.
Read more »
Discovery alert: With six new exoplanets, 5,500 discovery milestone passedOn Aug. 24, 2023, more than three decades after the first confirmation of planets beyond our own solar system, scientists announced the discovery of six new exoplanets, stretching that number to 5,502.
Read more »
Laundry baskets full of freshwater mussels key to keeping DuPage waterways cleanDuPage County’s Urban Stream Research Center is raising mussels in county forest preserve ponds that will eventually be released to help keep local waterways clean.
Read more »
Moon of Saturn has an equivalent of freshwater rivers and salty oceansThe liquid hydrocarbon seas, lakes and rivers on Titan have varying compositions and signs of active tides or currents
Read more »