Gyrodactylus Research Paper

My topic is about gyrodactylus species. Today I will go over the classification, the morphology, the gyrodactylus life cycle and finally, the infections and diseases. First, about the classification, Gyrodactylus sp. belongs to phylum Platyhelminthes with suphylum Neodermata, class Monogenoida, order Gyrodactylidae and genus Gyrodactylus. There has little controversy about the naming of class of these species. The class Monogenea was attributed by van Beneden (1858) and it was used to be an appropriate name in common use; but Bychowsky introduced the name Monogenoidea which is considered as an emendation of Monogennea van Beneden (1858). In fact, some specialists still favor Monogenea over Monogenoidea.

Gyrodactylus

Especially, they have strong muscular pharynx to brings the foods into the gut. They also absorb nutrients through the tegument. The excretory system is simple as well; with the flame bulb cells as we learned in the lecture. Unlike digeneans, which have excretory pores at posterior end of the body; all monogeneans excretory pores are located near anterior end. The picture shows the nervous system (in red color) of Gyrodactylus risavyi through laser micrograph. The nervous system is similar as most of species of phylum Platyhelminthes with cerebral ganglia at anterior end and extend out longitudinally in a ladder

Gyrodactylus sp. are monoecious. The male reproductive system consists of a single testis right under the ovary; and most of the species in this genus, sperms begin to mature just right after the first birth. The female reproductive system is complex and a single ovary is fully developed. The unique characteristic of genus gyrodactylus from other genera is they are all viviparous parasites. After fertilization, the uterus develops embryo instead of eggs. Most of them exhibit sexual reproduction by cross fertilization. The live young are reproduced by Russian doll fashion. They already contain a full embryo in uterus, and within this embryo, another embryo is developed, and also in this embryo, another one is developed. The first-born daughter is born 24 hours after the birth of the mother, and after 24 hours, this daughter reproduces and so on. This can be result in exponential growth in population of a single