"For at least two centuries, scientists have been enthralled by the zombie behaviors induced by mind-controlling parasites. Despite this interest, the mechanistic bases of these uncanny processes have remained mostly a mystery. Here, we leverage the recently established Entomophthora muscae-Drosophila melanogaster zombie fly system to reveal the molecular and cellular underpinnings of summit disease, a manipulated behavior evoked by many fungal parasites"

#Drosophila #Neuroscience #Parasitology #preprint

https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2022.12.01.518723v1?med=mas

@cyrilpedia Fascinating stuff. Makes you wonder what subtle behaviours are induced by the myriad of human parasitic infections (inc. viral/bacterial/etc) ... Does anyone else have a day of increased motivation and sociability, *just* before coming down with a cold? Could this be a parasite promoting spread to other hosts?

@tackley There is certainly a very well described sickness behaviour brought on by infections that is more of a host adapted phenotype (most likely) - but the range of direct host manipulation by parasites of all sizes, from toxoplasma to arthropods is vast

@cyrilpedia ... and I imagine we know only a little about a small subset of them?! Do you have any recommended reviews on "sickness behaviour"?

@tackley This one is by one of the leaders in the neuroimmunology field (but firmly in the 'immuno' end), Jony Kipnis at Wash U

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41577-021-00508-z

@tackley There's an aspect of it from the social side, of reduced activity and sociability in turn reducing the infection of conspecifics which, in evolutionary terms raises all the usual questions. But there is also a single host perspective on the energetics of the immune response.

This one from Ajay Chawla is not a review, but good intro, with good refs
https://www.cell.com/cell/fulltext/S0092-8674(19)30113-8?_returnURL=https%3A%2F%2Flinkinghub.elsevier.com%2Fretrieve%2Fpii%2FS0092867419301138%3Fshowall%3Dtrue

@tackley But going back to the origin of this toot suite (someone proposed this as alternative to thread, I wish I remembered who - but I didn't coin the term) these are all viewed as adaptive host responses, not parasite behavioural manipulation. For those there are very cool examples in both invertebrates (beyond the preprint in this suite, check out zombie ants) and the amazing things toxo does to a wide range of vertebrate hosts

@cyrilpedia Awesome, thanks. Will certainly dig out the toxo literature ... assume there's something in there on manipulative effects on humans.

@tackley Yes - and there is a subgenre of cat memes dedicated to toxo as the agent of feline domination of humans.