Generalism and the evolution of parasite virulence

•Support for the virulence trade-off theory is good but not perfect.•Parasites differ in their degree of host generalism.•Generalism is likely to impact virulence in four ways.•Incorporation of infectivity data may lead to better predictions of evolved virulence. The evolution of parasite-imposed ho...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Trends in ecology & evolution (Amsterdam) 2013-10, Vol.28 (10), p.592-596
Main Authors: Leggett, Helen C., Buckling, Angus, Long, Gráinne H., Boots, Mike
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Animal and plant ecology
Animal, plant and microbial ecology
Animals
Applied ecology
Biological and medical sciences
Biological Evolution
Conservation, protection and management of environment and wildlife
emerging diseases
evolution
Fundamental and applied biological sciences. Psychology
General aspects
host range
hosts
life history
parasites
Parasites - pathogenicity
Parasitic Diseases - microbiology
Parasitic Diseases - parasitology
Parasitic Diseases - transmission
prediction
Virulence
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Summary:•Support for the virulence trade-off theory is good but not perfect.•Parasites differ in their degree of host generalism.•Generalism is likely to impact virulence in four ways.•Incorporation of infectivity data may lead to better predictions of evolved virulence. The evolution of parasite-imposed host harm (virulence) will be affected by numerous factors, not least the range of hosts that parasites can infect. Here, we consider four ways that parasite host range (generalism) might directly affect observed levels of parasite virulence: costs of generalism, multiplicity of infection, maladaptive virulence, and host availability. Integrating parasite infectivity range with life-history evolution will generate novel general hypotheses for the evolutionary ecology of virulence, as well as explicit predictions about the virulence of emerging diseases resulting from host shifts.
ISSN:0169-5347
1872-8383
DOI:10.1016/j.tree.2013.07.002