Environmental determinants of haemosporidian parasite prevalence in a declining population of Tree swallows

Turcotte, Audrey; Bélisle, Marc; Pelletier, Fanie; Garant, Dany

doi:10.1017/s0031182017002128

Cited by 12 publications

(12 citation statements)

References 108 publications

(174 reference statements)

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“…Water is essential for aquatic larval development of vectors, and topographic features that increase surface water persistence promote increased abundance (Ferraguti et al, 2016;Ganser et al, 2016;González-Quevedo, Davies, & Richardson, 2014). In addition, anthropogenic factors such as habitat degradation, agriculture, and urbanization can all influence malaria dynamics (González-Quevedo et al, 2014;Turcotte, Bélisle, Pelletier, & Garant, 2018;Yanoviak, Paredes, Lounibos, & Weaver, 2006). Together, these factors have the potential to shape fine-scale spatial structuring in pathogen selection pressures and host immunogenetic variation.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Adaptive landscape genetics and malaria across divergent island bird populations

Armstrong

Davies

González-Quevedo

et al. 2019

Ecology and Evolution

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Environmental conditions play a major role in shaping the spatial distributions of pathogens, which in turn can drive local adaptation and divergence in host genetic diversity. Haemosporidians, such as Plasmodium (malaria), are a strong selective force, impacting survival and fitness of hosts, with geographic distributions largely determined by habitat suitability for their insect vectors. Here, we have tested whether patterns of fine‐scale local adaptation to malaria are replicated across discrete, ecologically differing island populations of Berthelot's pipits Anthus berthelotii. We sequenced TLR4, an innate immunity gene that is potentially under positive selection in Berthelot's pipits, and two SNPs previously identified as being associated with malaria infection in a genome‐wide association study (GWAS) in Berthelot's pipits in the Canary Islands. We determined the environmental predictors of malaria infection, using these to estimate variation in malaria risk on Porto Santo, and found some congruence with previously identified environmental risk factors on Tenerife. We also found a negative association between malaria infection and a TLR4 variant in Tenerife. In contrast, one of the GWAS SNPs showed an association with malaria risk in Porto Santo, but in the opposite direction to that found in the Canary Islands GWAS. Together, these findings suggest that disease‐driven local adaptation may be an important factor in shaping variation among island populations.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Adaptive landscape genetics and malaria across divergent island bird populations

Armstrong

Davies

González-Quevedo

et al. 2019

Ecology and Evolution

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“…Hence, measuring infection status after mate choice has occurred likely gives a good picture of this aspect at the time mating choices were made. It is probable, however, that some of the infections occurred on the breeding grounds, as we previously showed that local transmission is present in this study system ( Turcotte et al, 2018 ). This local transmission could also drive to some extent the non-random distribution of infected individuals we reported here.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 67%

“…While mate choice patterns are occurring prior to the sampling for infection, most of the infections detected are probably chronic ( Turcotte et al, 2018 ). Hence, measuring infection status after mate choice has occurred likely gives a good picture of this aspect at the time mating choices were made.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…For this study, 906 adult tree swallows (465 females and 441 males; 1,260 samples; Table 1 ) were sampled between 2012 and 2015 and screened for haemosporidian parasite infection, as detailed in Turcotte et al (2018) . Briefly, the detection of avian malaria from bird blood samples was performed with a nested PCR, which consists of two successive PCR amplifications ( Hellgren, Waldenström & Bensch, 2004 ).…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Effects of blood parasite infection and innate immune genetic diversity on mating patterns in a passerine bird breeding in contrasted habitats

Garant

Bourret

Schmitt

et al. 2018

PeerJ

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Genetic diversity at immune genes and levels of parasitism are known to affect patterns of (dis)assortative mating in several species. Heterozygote advantage and/or good genes should shape mate choice originating from pathogen/parasite-driven selection at immune genes. However, the stability of these associations, and whether they vary with environmental conditions, are still rarely documented. In this study, we describe mating patterns in a wild population of tree swallows (Tachycineta bicolor) over 4 years and assess the effects of haemosporidian parasite infection and immune genetic diversity at β-defensin genes on those patterns within two habitats of contrasting environmental quality, in southern Québec, Canada. We first show that mating patterns were only very weakly related to individual status of infection by haemosporidian parasites. However, we found a difference between habitats in mating patterns related to infection status, which was likely due to a non-random distribution of individuals, as non-infected mating pairs were more frequent in lower quality habitats. Mating patterns also differed depending on β-defensin heterozygosity at AvBD2, but only for genetic partners outside of the social couple, with heterozygous individuals pairing together. Our study underlines the importance of considering habitat heterogeneity in studies of sexual selection.

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“…A common thread among many of the studies included here is that anthropogenic changes to landscapes have a marked effect on diversity and community composition. Turcotte et al (2017) addressed this explicitly by examining the environmental predictors of parasite prevalence across human-modified habitats in a population of tree swallows that is in documented decline. The authors examined the potential for environmental stressors, using three habitats that varied in their level of anthropogenic influence, to amplify effects of parasitism.…”

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confidence: 99%

Flying into the future: avian haemosporidians and the advancement of understanding host–parasite systems

Dunn

Outlaw

2019

Parasitology

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There is a long history of avian haemosporidian parasites being used to address ecological and evolutionary questions (e.g. Hamilton and Zuk, 1982;Norris et al., 1994;McCurdy et al., 1998). Since the development of PCR techniques allowing molecular identification of haemosporidians from avian blood samples in the early 2000s (Bensch et al., 2000), however, there has been an explosion in our understanding of the species-and genus-level diversity within these parasites (Clark et al., 2014). Recent papers continue to add new lineages to the avian haemosporidian phylogeny but the focus is less on uncovering diversity and increasingly on understanding how this diversity has come about (e.g. Fecchio et al., 2018). Not surprisingly though, the system continually reminds researchers just how complex it is, and at times, seems unwilling to share its secrets.This collection of eight papers published in Parasitology in 2017 and 2018 encompasses and highlights the range and importance of ecological parasitology in understanding the factors that drive diversity among avian haemosporidians. Specifically, these papers highlight the diversity of avian malaria parasites, and the range of ecological questions this system can be used to address. We have broadly classified these papers into two collections: (1) basic biology of host/parasite systems and (2) ecological and evolutionary diversity.One of the take-home messages from this body of work is that, collectively, these papers show the variety of questions that can be addressed using avian haemosporidians as a system, but simultaneously, they show what questions remain unanswered. Many of these studies have uncovered previously unknown lineages (possibly species) of haemosporidians and most have tried to answer questions about mechanisms to explain how this diversity has arisen. Strikingly however, each study that has explicitly addressed factors to explain haemosporidian diversification has concluded that a multitude of other factors needs to be considered, leaving the field with more follow-up questions. This has led to a dramatic increase in known haemosporidian diversity but also to incremental advances in our understanding of the factors that drive the generation of this diversity. We hope that as we synthesize the many contributions of authors to the advancement of this field, we can spur more collaborative investigations of the 'why and how'.

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Environmental determinants of haemosporidian parasite prevalence in a declining population of Tree swallows

Cited by 12 publications

References 108 publications

Adaptive landscape genetics and malaria across divergent island bird populations

Adaptive landscape genetics and malaria across divergent island bird populations

Effects of blood parasite infection and innate immune genetic diversity on mating patterns in a passerine bird breeding in contrasted habitats

Flying into the future: avian haemosporidians and the advancement of understanding host–parasite systems

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