Authors: Thales Augusto Barçante Joziana Muniz de Paiva Barçante Sílvia Regina Costa Dias Walter dos Santos Lima
Publish Date: 2003/10/14
Volume: 91, Issue: 6, Pages: 471-475
Abstract
Biomphalaria glabrata snails were experimentally infected with Angiostrongylus vasorum firststage larvae and divided into four groups of 30 snails To assess the shedding of thirdstage larvae L3 the snails were maintained under different stimuli group 1 60 W light bulb for 24 h group 2 37 °C water bath for 24 h group 3 room temperature 23–25 °C for 24 h Group 4 room temperature 23–25 °C for up to 15 days After 24 h a total of 512 A vasorum L3 alive and active were released by snails from group 1 while 2446 L3 were released from group 2 and five L3 from group 3 After 15 days snails from group 4 released a total of 44 L3 To evaluate the infectivity of A vasorum L3 two mongrel dogs were successfully infected with L3 released by snails from groups 1 and 2 confirming that the infection of dogs with A vasorum L3 was possible independently of ingestion of the mollusk intermediate host The results shown in these experiments suggest that angiostrongylosis could be directly transmitted to the definitive hosts with implications for the parasite′s life cycleThe authors are grateful to Dra Leda Quercia Vieira for useful discussions and English review The authors wish to thank the technical staff of the Schistosomiasis Laboratory GIDEUFMG for supplying the Biomphalaria snails used in the experiments The authors also thank Edna Maia for technical advice The experimentation protocols complied with the current ethics laws of the Colégio Brasileiro de Experimentação Animal
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