Parasite Diversity and Diversification
Serge Morand, Boris R Krasnov and D Timothy J Littlewood (Eds)
Cambridge University Press, £80.00
Morand, Krasnov and Littlewood have gathered 26 papers written by more than 50 authors from around the world and amounting to almost 500 pages.
Cambridge University Press has delivered the papers in a superlative volume that is a great reminder that books are tactile objects; I would recommend that you get your hands on a copy.
The main stated objective of the book was to combine research on phylogenetics and evolutionary ecology in order to explain the development of parasite diversity and host diversification.
The reviews are grouped under three headings: evolutionary ecology of parasite diversity, evolutionary history of parasite diversity, and combining ecology and phylogenetics.
A rough breakdown of the papers finds 11 offer broad coverage, four are on viruses and protists, five are on helminths and six areon arthropods.
The hosts are both vertebrate and invertebrate, in aquatic and terrestrial habitats, which means there's something for everyone, and some papers focus on molecular methodology.
The volume is more than a set of papers on parasites: it will interest a wide range of researchers other than parasitologists, as its focus is the evolutionary and phylogenetic relationships between parasites and hosts and their diversification.
