Is a healthy ecosystem one that is rich in parasites?

By P. Hudson, A. Dobson, K. Lafferty. Trends in Ecology & Evolution, 2006

925 citations recorded by the source corpus.

Subfields: Ecology, Evolution, Behavior and Systematics, Genetics, Sociology and Political Science

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/ad6485eddea372cdc4f1315cc4239325bf8b6afe

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Citations in the corpus

Coextinction and persistence of dependent species in a changing world (2012, background): “Every class of affiliates, whether parasites (Hudson et al. 2006), commensals (Howells et al. 2011), or mutualists (Forup et al. 2008, Menz et al. 2011), provides ecosystem services (Cardoso et al. 2011).”
A macroevolutionary mosaic: episodic host‐switching, geographical colonization and diversification in complex host–parasite systems (2008, background): “…need to integrate history and historical processes as underlying factors, or the backbone, serving to influence the fundamental mechanisms, determinants and emergent patterns of ecological structure in complex systems (e.g. Hudson et al., 2006; Pedersen & Fenton, 2006; Lebarbenchon et al., 2008).”
A global parasite conservation plan (2020, background): “In particular, many parasites play critical roles in ecosystems by contributing to biomass flow, food web connectivity, and population control, and by driving the evolution of other species (Dunne et al., 2013; Hudson et al., 2006; Kuris et al., 2008; Lafferty et al., 2008; Sato et al., 2011).”
Homage to Linnaeus: How many parasites? How many hosts? (2008, background): “A healthy functioning ecosystem will have a full complement of parasitic species (63).”
Biodiversity Loss Affects Global Disease Ecology (2009, neutral): “At the same time, it is important to note that parasites can be important drivers of biodiversity and components of ecosystem health (Hudson et al. 2006).”
Effects of environmental change on helminth infections in amphibians: exploring the emergence of Ribeiroia and Echinostoma infections in North America. (2009, positive): “Simply stated, ecosystems with low levels of disturbance can be expected to support more diverse host and parasite communities (Hudson et al. 2006) .”
Fish Parasites as Biological Indicators in a Changing World: Can We Monitor Environmental Impact and Climate Change? (2011, background): “This would follow Hudson et al. (2006) who considered a healthy system to be one that is rich in parasite species.”
Is absence of proof a proof of absence? Comments on commensalism (2011, neutral): “parasites (Hudson et al., 2006).”
From Animalcules to an Ecosystem: Application of Ecological Concepts to the Human Microbiome (2012, background): “Nevertheless, changes in alpha diversity could provide a useful indicator of health status just as changes in plant diversity (Balvanera et al. 2006, Loreau et al. 2001) or animal diversity (Hudson et al. 2006) can sometimes be used as indicators of ecosystem health or function.”
An evolutionary ecology perspective to address forest pathology challenges of today and tomorrow (2016, background): “In this ecosystem perspective, fungal pathogens are no longer “enemies” but key actors of the evolution and ecology of local communities, andmore generally of the ecosystem health (e.g., Burdon 1987; Gilbert 2002; Hudson et al. 2006; Ostry and Laflamme 2009).”
Urbanization and Disease Emergence: Dynamics at the Wildlife–Livestock–Human Interface (2017, background): “Not surprisingly, such profound changes in trophic structure will have epidemiological consequences for pathogens within these communities, and as a general rule, declining host biodiversity should be matched by a loss in parasite diversity, thus reducing the pathogen pool and with it the risk of no”
Ecosystem consequences of fish parasites (2008, background): “Parasites, however, contribute a substantial component to biodiversity (Hudson et al., 2006).”