Tiny roundworms carve out unique parasitic niche inside pseudoscorpion's protective covering

"This is very strange," said George Poinar Jr., who has a courtesy appointment in the OSU College of Science."No other invertebrate-associated nematodes are known to have this detailed habit."Pseudoscorpions are a highly diverse lineage of arachnid, said Poinar, an international expert in using plant and animal life forms preserved in amber to learn about the biology and ecology of the distant past.

The fossil nematodes studied by Poinar show well-developed spear-type structures known as stylets. Similar to a hypodermic needle, a nematode uses its stylet to pierce cells and pull out food -- in this case from the pseudoscorpion's hypodermis, part of the outer covering known as the integument. Age estimates of Baltic amber vary widely, Poinar notes, from 23 million years to 55 million depending on who is doing the estimating and which method is used.

Baltic amber is a luxury material used in jewellery and handicrafts all over the world. Researchers have shown that Baltic amber arrived on the Iberian Peninsula at least in the 4th millennium BC, ...

Agriculture And Food Nature Biology Fossils Ancient DNA Origin Of Life Paleontology

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