The lineage diversity, spatiotemporal distribution and pathological significance of Plasmodium and Haemoproteus spp. infection of wild birds in Great Britain
Bibliographic record
Abstract
Avian haemosporidian parasites (AHPs), which include the genera Plasmodium and Haemoproteus , are protist parasites affecting at least 2000 species of birds with near global distribution. Outside of isolated, evolutionarily and immunologically naïve avian populations, the effects of AHPs on wild bird populations are poorly understood but have historically been considered benign. There is growing evidence to suggest, however, that high exoerythrocytic parasite burdens can cause disease and mortality in some host-parasite interactions, even in populations which have co-evolved alongside AHPs. Here, samples from 857 wild birds of 62 species, 27 families and eight orders were collected during post-mortem examinations over a 15-year period as part of a nationwide wildlife disease surveillance scheme and were screened by nested polymerase chain reaction (PCR) for the presence of Plasmodium and Haemoproteus . In total, liver and/or spleen tissues from 13.5% of birds (n = 116) tested PCR-positive, comprising 8.9% (n = 76) and 4.7% (n = 40) infected with Plasmodium and Haemoproteus spp., respectively. The highest rates of Plasmodium infection were seen in the families Paridae (36.3%; 4/11 birds examined) and Turdidae (34.5%; 51/148), consistent with previous reports. Spatial analysis revealed a significant cluster of Plasmodium -positive cases in Southeast England with possible explanations including climatic effects on parasite development or spatial variation in vector abundance. A total of 30 AHP lineages (20 Haemoproteus spp. and 10 Plasmodium spp.) were detected, 23 of which have not previously been reported in Great Britain, with four being apparently novel. Tissue samples from a subset of 13 Plasmodium -positive Eurasian blackbirds ( Turdus merula ) underwent histopathological examination, which revealed evidence of exoerythrocytic parasites, or other lesions consistent with avian malaria, in four and five cases, respectively. These changes were considered of equivocal significance in four birds, with only one bird diagnosed with acute malaria as a contributory cause of death.
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame machine prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.
Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.000 | 0.001 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.002 | 0.001 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.000 | 0.001 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Open science | 0.000 | 0.001 |
| Research integrity | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.001 | 0.000 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".