Bear Lake, one of the few natural lakes in Utah, possesses two interesting features: at least four endemic fish species live here, and many of the fishes in the lake use benthic invertegrates as a primary food source. Because of these features, Bear Lake provides an opportunity where relationships between parasites and their hosts can be studies in a community with a history of isolation and minimal external influences. Specific questions addressed in this study are: 1) Are fish helminth communities in Bear Lake stochastic, depauperate, and non-interactive or are they structured assemblages and interactive? And 2) Does the oligotrophic status of Bear Lake result in a parasite food web that is dominated by autogenic parasite species (species which use fish in the lake as both an intermediate and definitive host)? Parameters to quantify structure of helminth assemblages in Bear Lake fish include: prevalence, a diversity index, a dominance index, both qualitative and quantitative similarity indices, and site location of gastrointestinal helminths. A food web for Bear Lake parasites will be developed incorporating the interactions between fish definitive hosts, fish/benthic invertebrate intermediate hosts, and parasite infra- and component communities. Minority students involved in this project will study a natural host-parasite system. They will become knowledgeable and skillful in parasite ecology and learn fundamental aspects of interactions between parasites and their hosts that are applicable to most host- parasite systems including human host-parasite systems. Exposure to parasite ecological concepts will be especially useful to students that enter a biomedical field that involves studying the epidemiology of parasitic diseases of humans.

Project Start
1999-07-01
Project End
2000-06-30
Budget Start
1997-10-01
Budget End
1998-09-30
Support Year
6
Fiscal Year
1999
Total Cost
Indirect Cost
Name
California State University Northridge
Department
Type
DUNS #
055752331
City
Northridge
State
CA
Country
United States
Zip Code
91330
Alpizar, David; Laganá, Luciana; Plunkett, Scott W et al. (2018) Evaluating the eight-item Patient Health Questionnaire's psychometric properties with Mexican and Central American descent university students. Psychol Assess 30:719-728
Laganá, Luciana; Arellano, Kimberly; Alpizar, David (2017) Cognitive Functioning, Health Screening Behaviors and Desire to Improve One's Health in Diabetic versus Healthy Older Women. J Adv Med Med Res 23:
Mardirosian, Melina; Nalbandyan, Linette; Miller, Aaron D et al. (2016) Saw1 localizes to repair sites but is not required for recruitment of Rad10 to repair intermediates bearing short non-homologous 3' flaps during single-strand annealing in S. cerevisiae. Mol Cell Biochem 412:131-9
Giovannone, Dion; Ortega, Blanca; Reyes, Michelle et al. (2015) Chicken trunk neural crest migration visualized with HNK1. Acta Histochem 117:255-66
Benoun, Joseph M; Lalimar-Cortez, Danielle; Valencia, Analila et al. (2015) Rad7 E3 Ubiquitin Ligase Attenuates Polyubiquitylation of Rpn10 and Dsk2 Following DNA Damage in Saccharomyces cerevisiae. Adv Biol Chem 5:
Benes, Kylla M; Carpenter, Robert C (2015) Kelp canopy facilitates understory algal assemblage via competitive release during early stages of secondary succession. Ecology 96:241-51
Maciel, Michelle; Laganà, Luciana (2014) Older women's sexual desire problems: biopsychosocial factors impacting them and barriers to their clinical assessment. Biomed Res Int 2014:107217
Diamante, Graciel; Phan, Claire; Celis, Angie S et al. (2014) SAW1 is required for SDSA double-strand break repair in S. cerevisiae. Biochem Biophys Res Commun 445:602-7
Laganà, Luciana; Bloom, David William; Ainsworth, Andrew (2014) Urinary incontinence: its assessment and relationship to depression among community-dwelling multiethnic older women. ScientificWorldJournal 2014:708564
Laganá, Luciana; White, Theresa; Bruzzone, Daniel E et al. (2013) Exploring the Sexuality of African American Older Women. Br J Med Med Res 4:1129-1148

Showing the most recent 10 out of 137 publications