Comments on: There's just something about him…

By: The social network of solitary lizards | Australian Science

The social network of solitary lizards | Australian Science — Thu, 03 May 2012 00:59:14 +0000

[...] to great lengths to change the behaviour of their hosts. The Tom & Jerry dynamic witnessed in Toxoplasma gondii, and zombie ants are the more popular [...]

By: Geack

Geack — Mon, 07 Nov 2011 16:14:06 +0000

Q,
I don’t follow your logic. Why would an increase in sexual attractiveness require a loss of some beneficial genetic trait? There’s no reason to believe the increased attraction is a result of a mutation that would be passed to offsrping; it simply appears to be a consequence of the infection.

I’m hoping that answering your question a) is part of the ongoing research. They can’t leave us hanging like this

By: Q

Mon, 07 Nov 2011 15:45:16 +0000

I wonder what the mechanism could possibly be? I mean, I’m not saying evolution produces perfection in all cases, but I do think there’s a pretty strong evolutionary incentive to increase sexual attractiveness. So, I would imagine, in a normal rat, there’s not a whole lot that can be done to increase sexual attractiveness without significantly reducing some other important ability (otherwise, a mutation that causes this increase would very, very quickly spread through the whole population).

So, I wonder a) how exactly the infected rats become more attractive, and b) what the infected rats have to give up to do so?

By: David B. Benson

David B. Benson — Mon, 07 Nov 2011 04:21:44 +0000

Harrow — That research, of course, will never be published.

By: Harrow

Harrow — Mon, 07 Nov 2011 00:01:23 +0000

In a related story, graduate students at Johns Hopkins University are on the trail of a related species of Toxoplasma that conceals itself by infecting and modifying the behavior of medical journal referees to make them less likely to publish articles containing evidence of its existence.

-Harrow.

By: christopher

christopher — Sun, 06 Nov 2011 17:39:29 +0000

when my sister was pregnant with her first child, i warned her about this, but her dr said it wasn’t dangerous to the fetus. iwas soo pissed! not to mention that the worthless sperm-donor was too lazy and self-absorbed to clean the litter box for her…luckily,all went well. even go rid of the ‘father’ eventually.

By: linkfest – 11/06/11 « hbd* chick

linkfest – 11/06/11 « hbd* chick — Sun, 06 Nov 2011 17:02:02 +0000

[...] There’s just something about him… – the latest on the wonderfully weird Toxoplasma gondii from carl [...]

By: Brian Schmidt

Brian Schmidt — Sun, 06 Nov 2011 05:52:56 +0000

Seems like it wouldn’t be too hard to find a large-enough sample of young, recently-married human couples where the women grew up in cat-free environments (maybe allergic to cats) while the men had extensive exposure to cats, and then test the women.

One thing I’ve wondered about is how long, really, will the most of the parasites remain alive in people following exposure (and potentially affecting personalities). I would assume there’d by some kind of half life, that these things designed to live a rodent with a two-year lifespan can’t last forever, even if a few do last decades.

By: Murr Brewster

Murr Brewster — Sun, 06 Nov 2011 02:09:29 +0000

I could use a boost. I’m going to go eat a dead rat.

By: Felix

Felix — Sat, 05 Nov 2011 08:31:49 +0000

If you want to hear more about Toxoplasma Gondi listen to this great podcast:

http://www.virology.ws/2010/06/18/twip-12-toxoplasma-gondii/