Molecular Systematics of Cestode Parasites
Summary
Molecular systematics has revolutionised our understanding of tapeworm diversity, evolution and host associations by integrating genetic data with traditional morphology. Analyses of mitochondrial genomes, nuclear ribosomal loci and single-copy nuclear genes allow robust phylogenetic reconstructions across major cestode lineages. Techniques such as high-throughput sequencing and genome skimming now enable recovery of entire mitogenomes from preserved or non-model specimens, greatly expanding taxon sampling. Combined with advanced alignment and tree-building methods, these data have resolved longstanding ambiguities in family- and order-level relationships, revealed cryptic species complexes and clarified host-parasite co-evolutionary patterns. Molecular markers such as cytochrome c oxidase I and large-subunit ribosomal RNA offer species-level resolution, while concatenated multi-gene datasets support deeper phylogenetic splits. This framework underpins updated classification schemes, informs biodiversity surveys and guides control strategies against zoonotic tapeworms. Recent methodological advances include total-evidence phylogenomics and metadata synthesis of host records, which together highlight global cestode diversity and its significance for wildlife, livestock and public health.
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Molecular Systematics of Cestode Parasites publication trend
The graph below shows the total number of articles in molecular systematics of cestode parasites across all publications each year (not limited to Nature Index journals).
Technical terms
Mitogenome: The complete mitochondrial DNA sequence of an organism, encoding genes routinely used for phylogenetic and population studies.
Genome skimming: A low-coverage sequencing approach that recovers high-copy DNA elements, such as mitochondrial genomes, from total genomic DNA.
Cytochrome c oxidase I (cox1): A mitochondrial protein-coding gene widely employed as a DNA barcode for species identification and phylogeography.
Phylogenomics: The inference of evolutionary relationships using genome-scale data, often combining multiple genes or whole genomes.
Proglottid: A segment of a tapeworm’s strobila containing reproductive organs, used in morphological and molecular species delimitation.
References
- Genome skimming is a low-cost and robust strategy to assemble complete mitochondrial genomes from ethanol preserved specimens in biodiversity studies. PeerJ (2019).
- Comparative Characterization of Mitogenomes From Five Orders of Cestodes (Eucestoda: Tapeworms). Frontiers in Genetics (2021).
- Prevalence, incidence and molecular characterization of tape worms in Al Taif governorate, KSA and the effectiveness of Spirulina platensis as a biological control in vitro. Saudi Journal of Biological Sciences (2021).
- Host relationships and geographic distribution of species of Acanthobothrium Blanchard, 1848 (Onchoproteocephalidea, Onchobothriidae) in elasmobranchs: a metadata analysis. ZooKeys (2020).
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