Evidence map›Paper›PMID 24101466›Full record

ArticleProceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America2013

High diversity of West African bat malaria parasites and a tight link with rodent Plasmodium taxa.

Juliane Schaer, Susan L Perkins, Jan Decher, Fabian H Leendertz, Jakob Fahr, Natalie Weber, Kai Matuschewski

Open access · bronzeAbstract read
In one paragraph

Article in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 2013. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 80 papers.

0numbers the graph read from it
0cells of the map it votes in
80citing papers in PubMed
7.2field-weighted citation impact, top 2% of its field
1 · What the graph read from it

What it found

Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.

The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.

2 · The registry

The trial behind it

Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.

Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.

3 · Its place in the literature

Who cites it

80 citing papers in PubMed, 130 citations in OpenAlex.

  1. Article
  2. Article
  3. Article
  4. Article
  5. Article
  6. Microbial network assembly in bat flies with differing host specificity from North Africa.International microbiology : the official journal of the Spanish Society for Microbiology · 2025
    Article
  7. Targeted molecular screening for protozoan parasites in wild platypuses (International journal for parasitology. Parasites and wildlife · 2025
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  8. First molecular evidence ofVeterinary world · 2025
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  9. Article
  10. Malaria: past, present, and future.Signal transduction and targeted therapy · 2025
    Review
  11. Article
  12. International journal for parasitology. Parasites and wildlife · 2024
    Article
  13. Review
  14. Overview ofComparative medicine · 2024
    Review
  15. Article
  16. The relationships amongInternational journal for parasitology. Parasites and wildlife · 2024
    Article
  17. Article
  18. Article
  19. Review
  20. Review

20 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.

4 · The record

Corrections and comments

PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.

5 · Who and what money

Authors and funding

7 authors at 7 institutions in 2 countries.

Juliane SchaerParasitology Unit, Max Planck Institute for Infection Biology, 10117 Berlin, Germany.
Susan L Perkins
Jan Decher
Fabian H Leendertz
Jakob Fahr
Natalie Weber
Kai Matuschewski
American Museum of Natural History · USMax Planck Institute for Infection Biology · DEMax Planck Institute for Ornithology · DEMuseum für Naturkunde · DERobert Koch Institute · DEUniversität Ulm · DEZoological Research Museum Alexander Koenig · DE

Funding

No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.

6 · The paper itself

Abstract

As the only volant mammals, bats are captivating for their high taxonomic diversity, for their vital roles in ecosystems--particularly as pollinators and insectivores--and, more recently, for their important roles in the maintenance and transmission of zoonotic viral diseases. Genome sequences have identified evidence for a striking expansion of and positive selection in gene families associated with immunity. Bats have also been known to be hosts of malaria parasites for over a century, and as hosts, they possess perhaps the most phylogenetically diverse set of hemosporidian genera and species. To provide a molecular framework for the study of these parasites, we surveyed bats in three remote areas of the Upper Guinean forest ecosystem. We detected four distinct genera of hemosporidian parasites: Plasmodium, Polychromophilus, Nycteria, and Hepatocystis. Intriguingly, the two species of Plasmodium in bats fall within the clade of rodent malaria parasites, indicative of multiple host switches across mammalian orders. We show that Nycteria species form a very distinct phylogenetic group and that Hepatocystis parasites display an unusually high diversity and prevalence in epauletted fruit bats. The diversity and high prevalence of novel lineages of chiropteran hemosporidians underscore the exceptional position of bats among all other mammalian hosts of hemosporidian parasites and support hypotheses of pathogen tolerance consistent with the exceptional immunology of bats.

Indexed as

Africa, WesternAnimalsChiropteraFemaleGenetic VariationGenotypeHost-Parasite InteractionsHumansMalariaMaleMolecular Sequence DataParasitesPhylogenyPlasmodiumRodentiaSequence Analysis, DNAChiropteraHaemosporidahost–pathogen coevolutionmolecular phylogenyvector-borne disease

Identifiers

PMID24101466
PMCPMC3808598
OpenAlexW2152518132

What OpenQuestion holds

Textmetadata
Read underepoch 390

Registered trials

None linked

Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.