Biodiversity of Southeast Asian Parasites and Vectors Causing Human Disease

About this book

This thematic collection focuses on key parasites and their vectors in Southeast Asia. Up-to-date essays invite readers to discover parasite and vector morphology, genetic diversity as well as dynamic parasite communities linked to human land use and climate change. The authors shed light on transmission pathways and explore tick-borne diseases, intestinal protozoa, cestodes, nematodes and the multiplicity of cryptic trematode species. Particular attention is given to mosquito vectors in changing environments and the dynamic biodiversity of vertebrate hosts, including mammals, birds and fish.

The richly illustrated chapters are completed by new approaches in diagnostic methods, treatment and prevention to protect humans and animals from tropical parasite infections. Not only parasitologists and experts in tropical medicine but also public health officials and travellers will find Biodiversity of Southeast Asian Parasites and Vectors causing Human Disease highly informative.

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Biography

Dr Trevor Petney is currently working at the State Museum of Natural History in Karlsruhe and is a Visiting Professor at both the Universities of Khon Kaen and Mahasakhram in Thailand. His main research interests involve the complex dynamics of host-tick-pathogen systems, changes to host-parasite systems, including their biodiversity, under changing environments. He has published over 230 peer-reviewed papers and is currently a specialist editor for tick and tick-borne diseases for the International Journal for Parasitology.

Weerachai Saijuntha is an Associate Professor of Biochemistry at the Walai Rukhavej Botanical Research Institute, Mahasarakham University in Thailand. His research interests include the molecular systematics and population genetics of terrestrial animals, parasites, and vectors in Southeast Asia. The main focus of research is on pathogenic parasites and their snail intermediate hosts. He has been active in molecular systematics and genetic variation research of medially important trematodes and bithyniid snails for 12 years and has published over 60 peer-reviewed original research articles, refereed reviews, and specialist book chapters. He has received a number of national and international awards as a result of his research which is continuously improving our understanding of parasites and the diseases they transmit in Southeast Asia and globally.

Professor Heinz Mehlhorn studied at the Rheinische Friedrich-Wilhelms University of Bonn (Germany). He was chairman of the parasitological institutes in Düsseldorf and Bochum. As a former president of the World Society of Protozoology and a long-standing member of the steering committee of the World Society of Parasitologists, he runs ongoing lectures in parasitology in several countries and teaches courses for medical students in Düsseldorf. He has published a variety of specialist books on parasitological problems in German, French, English and Spanish. He holds patents on 12 antiparasitic drugs, which are the basis of products sold by the university spin-off company Alpha-Biocare GmbH (Neuss, Germany), which produces medications, repellents and wound care products for humans and animals.