The arms race in parasitism: A flea story
Abstract
Fleas are ectoparasitic hematophagous insects, that is, they live externally on vertebrate animals such as mammals and birds which serve as their hosts, feeding on the host’ blood. They have evolved with their hosts through an ecological association called parasitism, in which natural selection has influenced both groups through an evolutionary mechanism known as the arms race, which proposes that in order to survive, individuals of two or more species have constantly evolved during the competitive process of developing strategies or morphological, physiological or behavioral characteristics to avoid extinction. Thus, the arms race in parasitism has played an important role in the diversification of fleas and hosts.
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References
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