THE TRANSMISSION OF PNEUMOSTRONGYLUS TENUIS TO GUINEA PIGS

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Abstract
Pneumostrongylus tenuis developed partially in the central nervous system of infected guinea pigs, some of which developed severe neurologic signs, especially posterior paralysis. Damage to the central nervous system was noted in various regions of the brain and in the white matter of the spinal cord. There was no evidence that the worms will mature in guinea pigs and the number of worms recovered from infected animals was small. P. tenuis behaves in a rodent in the same way as in the normal ruminant host, in contrast to lungworms of carnivores in which the infective larvae become quiescent and encapsulated in the liver of small mammals without loss of infectivity. It is suggested that this ability to retain infectivity after encapsulation is not a general attribute of lungworms or other parasitic nematodes, but has had a long evolutionary history. It should clearly be distinguished from visceral larval migrans which it superficially resembles. Hypotheses to account for the origin of heteroxenous life cycles of nematodes of vertebrates are contrasted as they apply to the Metastrongyloidea.