No Tail No Fail: Life Cycles of the Zoogonidae (Digenea)

• Published in: Diversity
• Main Authors: Georgii Kremnev, Anna Gonchar, Alexandra Uryadova, Vladimir Krapivin, Olga Skobkina, Arseniy Gubler, Darya Krupenko
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: MDPI AG 2023
• Subjects: cercariae; metacercariae; Zoogonidae; Pseudozoogonoides subaequiporus; Zoogonoides viviapus; Buccinidae; Biology (General); QH301-705.5; White Sea
• Online Access: https://doi.org/10.3390/d15010121; https://doaj.org/article/23d6262c4c354646ab86b85ec6168687

The Zoogonidae is the only digenean family where known cercariae lack the tail but actively search for the second intermediate host. However, the data on the zoogonid life cycles are scarce. In the present study, we elucidated and verified life cycles of the Zoogonidae from the White Sea. Using rDNA data, we showed that Pseudozoogonoides subaequiporus utilizes gastropods from the family Buccinidae as the first intermediate host and protobranch bivalves as the second one. This life cycle can be facultatively truncated: some cercariae of P. subaequiporus encyst within the daughter sporocysts. Molecular data also confirmed previous hypotheses on Zoogonoides viviapus life cycle with buccinid gastropods acting as the first intermediate hosts, and annelids and bivalves as the second intermediate hosts. We demonstrated the presence of short tail primordium in the developing cercariae of both species. Based on the reviewed and our own data, we hypothesize that the emergence of tailless cercariae in the evolution of the Zoogonidae is linked to the switch to non-arthropod second intermediate hosts, and that it possibly happened only in the subfamily Zoogoninae. Basally branching zoogonids have retained the ancestral second intermediate host and might have also retained the tail.