Talk:Plasmodium/Archive 1

Topics for discussion

Regarding vaccination: is it at all possible to vaccinate against protozoa? --Eequor 14:23, 28 Mar 2004 (UTC)

This is a very good question. There are a LOT of people working on precisely this. The current (2007) answer is 'No' but this may change in the future.

A note for all potential editors. More than four species infect humans. This is a very common textbook error. I don't know why this mistake is reiterated in textbooks as the literature is clear on this point. Admittedly many of these cases have been published in journals with low citation index which it seems the writers of general medical text books don't seem to read. I have met people who have been infected with species other than the usual four so I can personally assure any readers of this page that the textbooks are wrong here.

Is there a citation for this claim of 11 species? I've been poking around pubmed and can only find the usual four human-infecting Plasmodium (P. falciparum, P. vivax, P. ovale and P. malariae) plus a few documented cases of P. knowlesi, but I can't seem to find others. I'm willing to believe there are others, but I'd really like to see this cited. Pancho (talk) 19:30, 20 July 2010 (UTC)

Sorry to take so long to get back to answering this question. There are at least 11 species that infect humans. One of the usual species listed Plasmodium ovale has been shown to be at least 2 distinct species. These cannot be distinguished on morphological grounds which explains why this was only found relatively recently. This brings us up to 6 species commonly infecting humans - 2 P. ovale species, P. falciparum, P. vivax, P. malaria and P. knowslesi. The others have been reported on an occasional basis and appear to have been acquired by people working in the tropics often looking for new species of malaria in primates. These are all rare - as far as presently we know. I probably should dig out the citations for these and put them into Wikipedia. Most of them are old and not that easy to locate but I will see what I can do. DrMicro (talk) 12:11, 19 November 2010 (UTC)

Invalid links to this article

There are some invalid links to this article because "plasmodium" also has another meaning in biology, not only the malaria parasite. It probably needs some good thinking to define the other meaning, but check for example links from Slime mould and Myxozoa. Taka 2 July 2005 16:33 (UTC) Note: the correct spelling of 'mould' is 'mould' and not 'mold'. The editor who did this looks like a newbie. If this is correct I would be grateful if they could practice in the sandbox instead of the article. Thanks in advance. DrMicro

Updates

There should probably be a seperate article devoted to that definition of plasmodium, as it refers to a stage in a slime mould's lifecycle and this article seems to be categorized more as an article about a specific genus in taxonomy, rather than a general definition of a word. --Ethidiumbromide 16:59, 4 August 2005 (UTC)

141.250.66.61 10:04, 8 January 2007 (UTC)Luis141.250.66.61 10:04, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

It seems that in Dec 2007 this pages was vandelised. Users of this page might find it helpful; to look at pages before this date also. I will get around to fixing this when I have a few minutes to do so. DrMicro

Notes

A few - very few - of the species listed here may be invalid. It is difficult to get an up to date listing of all the currently recognised species but the listing here combined with the notes should be reasonably trustworthy. DrMicro 22:32, 16 December 2006 (UTC)

P. acuminatum and P. adunyinkai have been difficult to confirm as species and may not be valid species. DrMicro 17:36, 27 December 2006 (UTC)

There are currently 171 species listed in the taxobox. 100 have been given subgenera. DrMicro 21:00, 27 December 2006 (UTC)

Addition of another species: P. lacertiliae. Also P. diminutivum is proving difficult to verify and should for the present be regarded as a dubious entry in the taxonomy. DrMicro

Addition of another species: P. beltrani. Two more entered into the subgenera listing. P. torrealbai is proving difficult to verify and may be incorrect.

Current listing: 173 species with 4 that should be regarded as dubious entries. Some listed in the taxobox are likely to be names that have now been replaced. Accordingly the valid species name listing is probably less than the 173 given here. Subgenera have been identified for 102 and all of these can be regarded as valid species - at least until molecular methods clarify (or confuse) the taxonomic position further. DrMicro

A number of new host species have been added under the avian malarias. These will be wikified when I can get around to it. Any help here is welcome. Also three additional species have been added to the taxobox. One species has been deleted from the subgenera listing and three added. This is virtually the entire list of currently recognised species.

Some of the species listed may need to be deleted as being invalid later but since this is now quite a large page it might be better to list the species to be deleted on this discussion page and delete several of them at one time as this is more sparing of Wikipedias servers. DrMicro

I think this page bar further minor edits, addition of the diagnostic criteria for the remaining subgenera, listing of the outstanding species by subgenus and inclusion or deletion of species is probably complete enough to be useful as a reference. Additional details will be located under the link to each species. Almost every species listed here has a vertebrate host listed. It may be worth listing the invertebrate hosts here or perhaps it may be better to do so under the species description instead. References and updates of course will always be welcome.

The molecular biology of malaria is largely known because of work on a single species - Plasmodium falciparum - and much of this may not be applicable to other species so I would suggest filing additional material relating to this under a seperate page.

Currently the dubious 'species' listed here are: P. acuminatum, P. adunyinkai, P. diminutivum and P. torrealbai. It seems likely that at least one or two given more may also be dubious. If anyone can confirm or refute these doubts their input would be most welcome. DrMicro 15:44, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

P. diminutivum having found a decent reference to it can now be taken off the dubious list. DrMicro 16:21, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

I am not sure if Plasmodium schweitzi is a valid species, or just a typing error of Plasmodium schwetzi 141.250.66.61 10:04, 8 January 2007 (UTC)Luis141.250.66.61 10:04, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

Thanks Luis. This was a typo on my part. If this is in the taxobox I will fix it when I get round to doing a clean up of the taxobox - which I will do shortly. I have been deferring this until I have (1) a little more time and (2) have checked a few more of the species validity. I have another three that seem likely to be valid and there are a few there that should now be deleted. If this typo occurs anywhere else on the article please feel free to fix it. Im deferring editing the taxobox until I have checked these species because as it is currently designed it requires the entire page to be backed up by the servers. The article weights in at ~45 kiliobyes at the minute so at a small risk of being misleading for a short time I trying to spare the servers. If you or anyone else wants to clean up the species list please feel free to do so. I would be grateful if you do if you could list the deleted ones here just in case one or other might actually be valid. DrMicro

Removal of incorrect species: Garnia gonatodi is incorrectly been called here Plasmodium gonatodi. The species was described by Telford in 1970 but has sometimes been referred to as a 'Plasmodium' species. DrMicro 19:47, 19 March 2007 (UTC)

Plasmodium wasielewski and Plasmodium subpraecox are now regarded as synonoms for Plasmodium relictum. I have included this point in the notes so a separate species unnecessary. DrMicro 20:13, 19 March 2007 (UTC)

Plasmodium praecox is now also regarded as synonyms for Plasmodium relictum. It has been deleted from the species listing. DrMicro 20:20, 19 March 2007 (UTC)

Plasmodium oti is now regarded as the same species as Plasmodium hexamerium. P. hexamerium is the preferred name for this species so I am deleting Plasmodium oti from the listing. DrMicro 20:37, 19 March 2007 (UTC)

Species listing notes

Plasmodium (Novyella) ashfordi - a new species that has just been described. I will update the article later. DrMicro

Update on the status of P. acuminatum, P. adunyinkai, P. diminutivum and P. torrealbai.

The status of Plasmodium acuminatum remains dubious. I think this was a mistake on my part and I am deleting this from the listing here.

Plasmodium adunyinkai I have since learned belongs to the Sauramoeba subgenus so this seems a valid species.

Plasmodium torrealbai was described in 1957 by J. V. Scorza and C. Dagert in an Anolis lizard found in Venezuela. The paper describing it is in Spanish and was not that easy to track down until recently.

Accordingly I am going to update the species listing with: Plasmodium ashfordi,Plasmodium adunyinkai and Plasmodium torrealbai; and to delete Plasmodium acuminatum from the list. I will also update the subgenera listings.

Curently 173 species are listed here with 104 with subgenera. There may be a few - probably less < 10 - remaining species that are not here yet but this listing can be regarded as fairly complete. DrMicro 16:46, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

Another species has been added - P. vassali - described in 1905. There may be some overlap with the other mammalian species - this requires DNA clarification. In the interim it has been described as a valid species and for this reason has been treated as such here. DrMicro 14:26, 19 February 2007 (UTC)

Having come across a few more species these have been added to the listings. DrMicro 16:42, 11 March 2007 (UTC)

Plasmodium smirnovi looks very dubious to me at the minute. As I cannot find a single reliable reference to this species I am deleting it.DrMicro 19:56, 19 March 2007 (UTC)

I have found a new list of validated species which I am now adding to the list. DrMicro

The current listing is now 212 species. DrMicro

Im having doubts about Plasmodium iganae. Will continue to check this. DrMicro 18:53, 8 April 2007 (UTC)

Plasmodium simondi: I suspect this has been reclassified as a Leukocytozoon species.

Plasmodium ratufae: this is currently regarded as a species of Hepatocystis.

Im removing three species because they have been reclassified as Hepatocystis. All recalssified species will be listed at the bottom of the main page.

Plasmodium necatrix: this species looks dubious at the minute. Assuming it is incorrect there are 208 species in the list presently. This number is likely to continue to vary.

Four additional species have now been added bringing the total to 212 in all.

Plasmodium carinii is incorrect (as I suspected earlier). It has been deleted. Total is now 211 species. DrMicro 22:39, 16 April 2007 (UTC)

Plasmodium clelandi looks dubious DrMicro 22:43, 16 April 2007 (UTC)

Plasmodium bastianelli is not a valid species but rather a subspecies of Plasmodium cynomogli. It has been deleted. DrMicro 22:45, 16 April 2007 (UTC)

Removal of Plasmodium gonatodi *again*. I should have read my own notes above this. DrMicro 22:50, 16 April 2007 (UTC)

Further editing: Another species has been added - Plasmodium jiangi. Running total is 209. An additional 10 species has very recently been described and I will try to add these shortly. DrMicro 14:47, 18 April 2007 (UTC)

I am virtually certain that Plasmodium simondi has been reclassifed as Leukocytozoon simondi - a major bird parasite. I am deleting the Plasmodium entry. DrMicro 14:49, 18 April 2007 (UTC)

Three new species have been added. —Preceding unsigned comment added by DrMicro (talk • contribs) 18:44, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

Thirty three new species have been added. DrMicro (talk) 11:52, 14 June 2008 (UTC)

Three new species have been described. These have been added. DrMicro (talk) 14:42, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

Another nine species added. DrMicro (talk) 20:22, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

Dubious species

I have been through the current listing of species. All the species given are mentioned in the scientific literature but a number may have been reclassified into different genera. Any species with a link to its own page can be regarded as currently valid. There are a number of species i haven't yet got around to creating pages for: most of these species are valid. I going to post a list of those most likely to be dubious in this section. If anyone can clarify their status I would be most grateful. DrMicro.

There are currently 16 species on this list.

• Plasmodium acuminatum
• Plasmodium adunyinkai
• Plasmodium anomaluri
• Plasmodium bowiei
• Plasmodium brasiliense
• Plasmodium chalcidi
• Plasmodium clelandi - may be a Haemogregarina species
• Plasmodium divergens - may be a Babesia species
• Plasmodium fabesia
• Plasmodium iguanae - may be a Lainsonia species
• Plasmodium landauae - may be a Schellackia species
• Plasmodium majus
• Plasmodium murinus
• Plasmodium necatrix
• Plasmodium uluguruense
• Plasmodium uncinatum

Host species listing

As no guide lines currently exist for this purpose I have been using the following method: vertebrate host species are listed in alphabetical order of their official or binomial name. The link to the species page (when it exists) is provided only on the official name. The official names should be unique and in this way confusion between host species should be reduced.

For the invertebrate vectors I have first grouped the species by genus and then within this section by species and listed the parasites they can carry.

While this usage is inconsistent it is fairly typical of many parasitology books and makes sense to the users of this data. For this reason I have used it here and would recommend that this continued to be used. DrMicro 19:52, 19 March 2007 (UTC)

Talk

Thanks Nulzilla for removing that silly vandalism. DrMicro

Dear DrMico, The page you have constructed here from the old Plasmodium page is one of the most extensive reviews of the taxonomy of the genus that I have seen, I am very pleased to see it here. I came across it this page while researching for a similar review. I would be grateful to have some direct contact with you as I would like to discuss the content of the page and perhaps sufficient citations to be able to refer to some the material in my review. I have registered with Wikipedia so that you can contact me directly Looking forward to hearing from you Zmartine 00:28, 3 February 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for the kind words. I have tried your email as given and it does not appear to work. DrMicro

--> I have fixed the email error, please try again. Thanks. Zmartine 05:04, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

I have replaced the subspecies and host parasite listings. These are useful information to those working with malaria. I am not clear as to why they were deleted some time ago so I presume this was an editing error. DrMicro —Preceding unsigned comment added by 159.134.58.241 (talk) 16:44, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Some unidentified editor made changes here that broke over 200 links, misspelled text and lost an image. These changes were _not_ appreciated. If you wish to make changes please test them in the sand box before saving them to the server. DrMicro (talk) 14:02, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

Article length

This article now comfortably exceeds the recommended length for a Wikipedia article. It is likely to become even longer. Given that this is a primary reference page for Plasmodium it is arguable that it is better not broken up unless there are technical reasons to do so. DrMicro 19:26, 27 February 2007 (UTC)

Evolution Section

If there is an evolution section then some mention of the connection between malaria parasites and photosynthestic organisms should be made. The parasite contains an organelle, the apicoplast, which is analogous to the chloroplast of photosynthetic organisms. Analysis of the genome of this organelle and nuclear genes suggests that the dinoflagellates (consisting of free-living and parasitic forms) are the closest relatives of the apicomplexans. Urselius 14:36, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

Excellent point. On my (already overlong) ToDo list is a paper on the mitochondria of these organisms. I will add something in here and come back to later.

GA Candidacy

I don't have time to go through this article in detail at the current moment, but I can say that the article will be way too listy to pass in its current form. All the extensive lists should be placed in separate list articles with links to them here. Hope this will help. DJLayton4 (talk) 00:29, 26 April 2008 (UTC)

GA Review April 2008

Hello. After reviewing this article, I have made the decision to fail the article. Here are the reasons:

• There is some problems with how well the article is written. Its prose is a little difficult to understand in some areas. I understand that it's a scientific article, but its still not a reason for this article not to flow smoothly.
• The introduction is the area located immediately above the table of contents. You should not have a second "introduction" section below the table of contents.
• Evolution of the genus should really be discussed separately from the plasmodium life cycle. That section is a little bit difficult to follow. If you're going to talk about the life cycle of species in the genera, then write that. If you're talking about the evolution of the genus, then talk about that. But I think its entirely possible to discuss one without the other as combining into the same section leads to difficulty in understanding.
• The main problem with this article ever reaching good article status is the fact that it is almost all list. Lists of species by subgenera, list of species that infect humans, list of species that infect primates, etc. etc. A good article (by WP:GA criteria) is not composed of lists. If your goal is to turn this article into a good article or into a featured article, then I would suggest that you spin off all/some of these lists into separate articles. For example, create a new article entitled "List of Plasmodium by subgenera", list of Plasmodium that infect humans", etc. and transfer these lists into those articles. Then you can simply link to these lists from within this article. Good articles need to be composed mostly of prose, so excessive lists and tables within the article are discouraged.
• "Notes" sections within an article are discouraged. If present, they should generally be located at the end of an article. If you decide to spin your long lists off into separate article (which is highly encourage you to do) then the associated notes can be transferred to the end of those articles as well.
• I transformed your longest list into a multi-column list. These are in general easier to read as less scrolling is required.
• Your references look good and appear to be appropriately formated and adequately used throughout the article.

Let me know if you have any additional questions. will381796 (talk) 13:06, 26 April 2008 (UTC)

Changes

Introduction has been moved.

Some sub sections have been reorganised.

Consideration is being given to splitting this into (probably) 4 articles: general and then for each species group. The bird and reptile groups may be better together as from the phylogenetics these appear to be closely related and future revisions will probably groups these as a new genus or higher taxonomic clade. The primate species seem to form natural grouping as do the non primate mammals. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.43.121.108 (talk) 14:28, 26 April 2008 (UTC)

The molecular biology section can probably be moved out entirely. Almost all the work in this species has been done on P. falciparum only and its applicability to other species except in the most general terms is debatable. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.43.121.108 (talk) 14:32, 26 April 2008 (UTC)

Most of the changes recommended haves been carried out. The new pages all need work to bring them up to a useful standard. DrMicro (talk) 12:43, 29 April 2008 (UTC)

Reclassification of Plasmodium in intro

I removed the following paragraph from the intro: see WP:NOTCRYSTAL.

As of 2006[update], the genus is in need of reorganization as it has been shown that parasites belonging to the genera Haemoproteus and Hepatocystis appear to be closely related to Plasmodium. It is likely that other species such as Haemoproteus meleagridis will be included in this genus once it is revised.

Perhaps this could be cited, reworded as a statement, rather than a call for action, and placed somewhere in the article?

Wawot1 (talk) 23:30, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

This is a messy issue. The known phylogenetic trees show some Haemoproteus species lying with the taxon currently known as Plasmodium. Some others lie outside this grouping. There is little question that this will happen: the difficulty is in gathering enough biological material to extract the DNA from to do this reorganisation. Quite a few of the listed species are known only from a single paper and the material used in the paper may no longer exist or be unusual for DNA extraction. Also funding for taxonomic work isn't exactly plentiful - which is why the taxonomy remains a mess.

It can be safely said that the species listed in the introduction should be regarded as a species of Plasmodium but that the current classification does not name it so.

Thanks for the clarification. My objection with the paragraph has less to do with the content as with the wording. I don't think that sentences of the form: "X is likely to happen in the future." should be in an encyclopedia article, especially not in the introductory paragraph. I think the WP:NOTCRYSTAL policy is clear on this point.

I'm not conversant with the literature, or else I would change it myself, but perhaps this paragraph could be reworded in the form:

"Recent taxonomic research shows some Haemoproteus species lie within the taxon currently known as Plasmodium. X,Y, Z taxonomy authorities have suggested that the phylogenetic trees should be reorganized so that species such as Haemoproteus meleagridis are included in this genus." Then quote the paper. What do you think? Wawot1 (talk) 12:40, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

Wikipedia policy: "Individual scheduled or expected future events should only be included if the event is notable and almost certain to take place. If preparation for the event is not already in progress, speculation about it must be well documented."

The reclassification issues are considered by all experts in this area to be almost certain to take place. All taxonomy papers on this topic do conisider this problem. The methods are available. Its *just* a question of doing the sequencing. DrMicro (talk) 12:11, 22 July 2009 (UTC)

Reason for Increase in Osmotic Pressure

The Life cycle section contains this claim

digestion of haemoglobin increases the osmotic pressure

The claim is false. I am guessing it is just an editing mistake, as the rest of the paragraph is correct.

In simplistic terms the increase in osmotic pressure of the red blood cell is because of the holes that the Plasmodium pokes in the cell membrane. The Wikipedia article correctly cites the seminal reference on the colloid-osmotic hypothesis, the article by Lew et al. The article is Reference [9]. From that article

They also induce a large increase in the permeability of the host cell plasma membrane

I would use a phrase from the Lew article as part of the rewording of the Wikipedia paragraph

At the molecular level a set of enzymes known as plasmepsins which are aspartic acid proteases are used to degrade hemoglobin. The parasite digests 70-80% of the erythrocyte's haemoglobin [8]. The reason proposed for this apparently excessive digestion of haemoglobin is the colloid-osmotic hypothesis. [9] The parasite induces a large increase in the permeability of the host cell plasma membrane. The increased permeability raises the osmotic pressure within the infected erythrocyte. Without a contravening factor, the increase in osmotic pressure would cause the erythrocyte to rupture before the parasite is mature. The immature parasite would die. To avoid this fate the parasite digests and exports much of the haemoglobin from the erythrocyte. The loss of haemoglobin slows the increase in osmotic pressure. The slower increase keeps the cell volume below the rupture point until the parasite is mature. The colloid-osmotic hypothesis has been experimentally confirmed. [10]

• This is an excellent point that the editor that has made. It is incorrect to say that the statement is false. Digestion of a large protein within a tends to increase the osmotic pressure within it. This follows because osmotic pressure is one of the colligative properties of matter. The laws governing osmotic pressure were first described by W. F. P. Pfeffer and J. H. van’t Hoff in the 1800s. DrMicro (talk) 21:51, 15 January 2010 (UTC)

Old vandalism

I restored text which was removed a year ago on an unnoticed vandalism. I hope I made no mistakes, but this isn't my field so someone who knows his way around this should probably check after me. --Muhandes (talk) 20:09, 20 July 2010 (UTC)

Long list in taxobox

Taxoboxes are designed to give information at a glance, a long list of species is not glancable.

I'm not sure why you insist the list be in the taxobox. Can you please explain why the list, which is completely unreadable in the taxobox, must be there? --Kleopatra (talk) 06:48, 20 November 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for the note Kleopatra, and apologies to DrMicro for not getting back to you. I agree with Kleopatra and Stemonitis that having a full list of species in the taxobox makes it clumsy and that having the subgenera in it is better. If there are species that you do not know which subgenera they belong in, I think a List of Plasmodium species would be the best solution. SmartSE (talk) 11:23, 20 November 2010 (UTC)

I agree that the size of the taxobox was an issue and have reverted to the subgenus list. If the option put forth by SmartSE is not used I have another option that might work. I would suggest a incertae sedis section at the end of the "Species by subgenus" section as a holding area for those species that are not placed to subgenus. (possible not placed in the literature?) Having all the species in the taxobx is not what the taxobox is for and removes its use as a quick information guide on the page.--Kevmin § 09:38, 22 November 2010 (UTC)

Im afaid I will have to disagree here on this matter for the moment anyway. I have at least three reasons for so doing The first is traditional. Every book on parasitiology and every encyclopedia have a table of species listed usually near the from of the article. This is done at least in part to give some idea of the size and complexity of the genus.

Many texts on different Zoological and botanical groups do this. This does not men we have to here, when I link to the appropriate section of the article will work just as well.--Kevmin § 10:46, 22 November 2010 (UTC)

This statement I find a little vague and lacking in detail. It is true that reference texts do list (say) families on one page and have seperate pages for the genera in the family. But they do list the species on the page discussing the genus. Which is what has been done here.

The second reason is ease of maintanance. Its considerably harder to keep track of the various species when they are scattered on different pages. I know this from working on several large genera - Leukocytozoon, Sarcocystis, Eimeria, Haemocystis and others.

For those not familiar with the Zoological code the only recognised subdivisions of a genus are subgenus and species. The subgenus listing alone will not suffice here for reasons explained below.

It is not the only listing, the species can be listed in the main text, with a link to that section in the taxobox along with the subgenera.--Kevmin § 10:46, 22 November 2010 (UTC)

Listing them in the main text is used on some of the wikipedia pages with languages other than English. IMHO this simply does not work for the numers invovled.

The suggestion of just listing the subgenera is not a runner as I have been unable to place all the 250 odd species into subgenera. This is not from lack of trying. Some species have been so poorly described that it is virtually impossible to place them into a subgenus at the present time. This situation may change in the near future with the increasing use of DNA based taxonomy.

I am rather concerned by this statement. Please clarify what you are saying as it sounds at this point like you are generating OR. If there isnt a placement to subgenus in the type description or a subsequent paper then i can not be placed to subgenus here, but is sounds as though that is what you are attempting to do???--Kevmin § 10:46, 22 November 2010 (UTC

The issue is simple. Several - possibly all of the species that have not been placed in subgenera on Wikipedia probably can be placed into a subgenus. It is simply that I have not been able to determine which subgenus the author has placed them in or that the information I have about the organism is insufficent for me to place them in a subgenus. If you or anoy other contributor can manage to place them in the correct subgenus I for one will be very grateful. Having tried very hard to do just this I can assure you the task is not easy. But it one that should be done. If any one reading this wants to take the baton and run with it they have my blessing. DrMicro (talk) 23:27, 22 November 2010 (UTC)

Determine as in read through the literature and place the species per an authors placement is fine. This sounds to me though, like you are making placements for species that have never been officially placed in any of the lit which would be unacceptable OR. --Kevmin § 23:41, 22 November 2010 (UTC)

As far as I can tell editor Kevmin has yet to make a first asignment of a Plasmodium species to any subgenus. I would hope given the number of references on the species pages that I have been very assidious to trying to track down the original descriptions of the species as far as possible. A number of species - in fact the majority of them - were named before the current list of subgenera were created. In quite a number of cases it is very difficult to decide which subgenus the species should be in from this description. Rather than err in assigning the species to an incorrect subgenus I have decided not at attempt to do so until I am certain that I have enough information to do so. DrMicro (talk) 23:51, 22 November 2010 (UTC)

I confess that I am somewhat surprised at the level of attention this relatively trivial matter is generating. I have never been involved in an edit war before this and have no wish to be invovled in one. On the ther hand I am extremely cross over the delberate removal of information from wikipedia - information that has taken me several months if not years to put together. Im very open to useful suggestions that do not involve the removal of information from here. I do not think that the use of subgenera only in the taxobox is workable for the reasons explained. I do think that having a taxobox on the page is extremely helpful for the reasons I have outlined. I am not averse to alternatives as you can see on the Taxonomy of Anopheles page. That page is somewhat different as the genus has been subdivided into a variety of taxa below subgenus and above species.

The taxobox was never meant to have that amount of taxa in it. Take a look at the articles on large plant families such as Asteraceae, Rosaceae, and Malvaceae. None of them attempt to put large numbers of taxa into the box, rather they have links to the appropriate subfamilies, and more comprehensive listings are in the main body of the text. There is no reson that this page should be different. --Kevmin § 10:46, 22 November 2010 (UTC)

This is perhaps a tad more complicated than that. Species and genus level is about as atomic as it gets. Admittedly there are subspecies but these are usually relatively few compared with the genus. I will I admit it is a possibility but I think this will run into the same problem as listing the species in the main text. This IMHO simply doesnt work well.

Having examined the links for the families suggested above I find that for most of the genera - once you get down that far in the taxonomic tree - actually have very few species listed. One welcome exception is the genus Triumfetta which does have a few. At the time of writing there is very little on this page other than a species listing. Incidentally the species listing on the page is also incomplete. I'm afraid I dont see how much of an improvement listing 250 species in the body of the text will improve readility of the article which I presume is what you intend here compared to having them on the right hand side beside the main text. Might I suggest you have a look at the non English wikipedia pages and see how readable they are. DrMicro (talk) 23:41, 22 November 2010 (UTC)

As a counter example the genus Bencomia one of the genera of the Rosaceae has only four species. IMHO this article would be more readable if these four were moved to the taxobox. It seems to be to be a tad pointless puting such a short list in the main text as this is what taxoboxes were created for. DrMicro (talk) 23:46, 22 November 2010 (UTC)

I was meaning for you to look at how the family pages themselves are handled, as they have similar numbers of subtaxa overall. Non-English wikis may have different style preferences, however the methods used at the families I linked above are the generally used ones here. Take a look at Rosa and Senecio if you want a genus level examples. I have placed the species into the taxobox on the Bencomia page.--Kevmin § 00:20, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

Having just examined the Bencomia page I find that the species have yet to be placed within it which is somewhat at odds with the above statement. Given that most species within genera are I think listed in taxoboxes and that the creators and mantainers of the taxobox are happy to have species listed in these constructs might it not be a better place to take up this discussion with them. To wit (1) that species should not be listed in a taxobox (2) that allowing for this option was a serious design mistake and (3) that editors have been improperly been making use of this error for years now.

The [[Bencomia] there was a typo in the syntax of the template that resulted in them not showing, its has been fixed. There are no overarching "designers" and "constructors" in the sense you are implying. (1) As has been stated a number of times now to you, it is the NUMBER of species in THIS taxobox that makes THIS taxobox impractical. At no point has any other editor claimed that this is a wiki wide problem. Only that its is a problem with how it is being used HERE. To claim otherwise is false. --Kevmin § 14:27, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

The fact that Bencomia was quoated as an example and was subsequently shown to be incorrect I think speaks volumes. I also find it curious that there is now a list of the species on the page and also in the taxobox. This to my admittedly non botanical eye looks a tad redundant and not very helpful.

"The taxobox was never meant to have that amount of taxa in it." Perhaps '... never meant to have that number' might be gramatically more correct. Unless the author if this statement was a designer of the taxobox this is merely an opinion purporting to be a fact. If not the current number of species then how many? Bencomia has now four species in its taxobox. This it seems Kevmin has abrogated the decision as to the number of species than can be used in a taxobox - a choice that the original authors of the page chose not to do. I am unclear on the authority by which kevmin can decide which species can go into a taxobox and which cannot and what number if any. I am currently unaware of a maximum size limit on the number of species than can be used within this element. I feel certain that if the creators of the XML element wanted a maximum limit they would have imposed one. Mind you I am inclined to agree that something will have to be done about the Eimeria genus with potentially 1700 species and no recognised subgenera. This is a situation that the taxobox might have difficult coping with. I am very open to suggestions on this matter.

Concerning non English versions of wikipedia. I confess that were I to suggest major changes to a page I might examine what has been done on similar pages elsewhere in Wikipedia as it is possible that some one might have a better idea.

Concerning creators and designers. All XML elements on wikipedia have been created by someone who had to make deliberate design choices. If they made poor ones then in my opinion the matter should be taken up with the designers of the element. Even if the designers of this element are no longer active on wikipedia - a matter on which I have no information - it is common knowledge that there is a number of active maintainers of these elements.DrMicro (talk) 15:56, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

I would rather offer a different suggestion. That the taxoboxes are well designed and properly used but that for some of the larger genera they can be awkward and that a modification of the taxobox much like that of the original ref list tag may be in order if this is causing a problem.

Moot see above comment.--Kevmin § 14:27, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

I would also posit that the taxobox used here has been in use for several years, that the arictle has reached B status with it and that this page has ~1000 visitors each day and only 3 have objected to its used in several years. To me this suggests that if there is a problem it is a relatively small one and the tome spent on this issue might perhaps have bene better spent elsewhere on Wikipedia.

Moot see above comment.--Kevmin § 14:27, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

I would also suggest that examing what has been done on Wikipedia pages other than the English language ones might be helpful before sonsidering extensive page changes.DrMicro (talk) 13:31, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

Moot see above comment.--Kevmin § 14:27, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

If there are any useful suggestions on this matter might I suggest that this is the place to discuss them rather than starting a pointless edit war. DrMicro (talk) 09:52, 22 November 2010 (UTC)

incertae sedis

The species incerta is not an option. That has a special meaning in the literature and it is not applicable here. Species are the bed rock of biology. Species are described and are what users need to know about. Subgenera and higher taxa are creations of the human mind to try to organise species into recognisable groups. The improper emphasis being placed on the higher taxa is IMHO misplaced and simply wrong. DrMicro (talk) 09:57, 22 November 2010 (UTC)

Incertae sedis is not a species. it is a Latin designation indicating a taxon has not been placed into a higher taxon, and that is all. Therefore the objection to the tern at this point doesn't make sense. All taxonomic designations including species, subspecies, and varieties are human attempts to pigeon hole organisms into an understandable framework. just look at the discussions surrounding the definition of species. --Kevmin § 10:46, 22 November 2010 (UTC)

The statement about is slightly misleading. The term Incertae sedis is usually used - at least as I understand it - for descriptions that are too vague to place the species into a taxon. That is not the problem here. The species have been validly described. They should be assignable to a subgenus. It just that I and it seems any other contributor here to date - have been unable to locate a sufficently good description of the species to place it into a subgenus. If anyone can locate a sufficently detailed description of the species that have not been placed into a subgenus to date here and can write it for wikipedia I will be most grateful. I know I have tried to do this for all the ones that are not yet in the subgenus collections. It may be that more material has become available since I last tried and what was not possible then may be now. DrMicro (talk) 23:27, 22 November 2010 (UTC)

PER my statement above, this is sounding very close to OR. --Kevmin § 23:41, 22 November 2010 (UTC)

If attempting to assign species to the correct subgenus qualifies as OR then I plead guilty. As far as possible I have used the authors designation. I have been able to asign subgenus to very very few of the species when the author has not done so. These species were in the subgenus Vinkea which is a taxonomic rag bag for all species infecting mammals other than primates. If it is OR to assign species to a subgenus that the authors have not done so already then it would be OR to attempt to place any of the remaining ~150 species to a subgenus here on wikipedia. DrMicro (talk) 23:56, 22 November 2010 (UTC)

Kevmin is right about Incertae sedis. It means it cannot be assigned to a higher taxon, whether it is nicely described or not. It generally means that there are no copnclusive charactetistics to warrant assignment to a specific taxon. See for example the excell list of the world bird names that lists 5 Incertae sedis families http://www.worldbirdnames.org/names.html -- Kim van der Linde ^{at venus} 00:44, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

The species are well described and can be placed into higher taxa - at the genus level and above. The only taxonomic level that is currently lacking is the subgenus level. Many genera do not have recognised subgenera but this does not mean that all the species in the genus are Incertae sedis.

If that is the case, then creating a separate article listing them all without subgenera, or Kevmin's suggestion after mine looks like it would be the best way to solve this. I agree with Kevmin that if you're placing them into subgenera based on what you know, rather than what the authors wrote, it is OR. SmartSE (talk) 00:15, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

A number of well known species including the type species Plasmodium falciparum were described before the creation of the currently used subgenera were created. If Smartse is correct then we should delete the page Plasmodium and go back to the genus Ocillatoria as Laveran did and drop the species name falciparum which was coined later after the gametocytes were identified. This would IMHO at least cause considerable confusion to non experts in this area. Likewise we should drop all the sungenera that Garnham created in the 1960s as these were not used in the original descriptions of the species.

Dropping all the subgenera here would resolved this discussion completely. On the other hand having the species asigned to a subgenus is a short hand method of sumarising the some of characteristics of these species. The phylogenetic relationship of these species is not yet worked out. It is presumed that the subgenera reflect the underlying phylogenetic relationships but this is not yet certain in most cases. In fairness where it has been tested the subgenera seem to form fairly coherent groups but the branching order is anything but clear for most of them. This is purely because of the lack of sequence data available from them.

Some of the criteria for the subgenera are easily applied. Inclusion in Vinkeia only requires that the species be iloated from a non primate mammal. Ophidiella only requires that the species be isolated from a snake. These criteria do not agree with the usually used criteria for subgenera where DNA sequence data is available. This particular genus has very little DNA sequence data available but these are the criteria laid down by Garnham in his book on the Haemosporida in the 1960s which have been used ever since by all experts the world over. It seems almost certain when DNA sequences for these species do become available that there will be considerable revision of at least some of the subgenera. It not OR to say place a species described in the 1920s isolated from a non primate into Vinkeia a subgenus that was not described until fourty years later. If this is OR then virtually all the taxonomy in Wikipedia will need to be revised back to that of at least Linnaeus if not Aristotle. If this policy was followed then IMHO wikipedia would lose a considerable amout of its credibility as the taxonomic system has been updated considerably since the time of Linnaeus.

Placing a species in the incorrect subgenus is a serious mistake and IMHO this is best avoided until the description is sufficiently clear to allow for its placement. For quite a number of species in this genus I have been unable to determine which if any of the recognised subgera the species should be placed in and have avoided so doing. It would be much more useful instead of engaging in this discussion to go and see if it is possible to put the remaining species in the correct subgenera. DrMicro (talk) 13:17, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

A species not placed in a subgenus by an authority is Incertae sedis for subgenus placement. Placing such a species in a subgenus is original research. Simple solution. Place all species assigned to ma subgenus in the subgenera and make a list of unassigned species for the rest. Problem solved. -- Kim van der Linde ^{at venus} 15:55, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

This is essentially what has already been done here already. DrMicro (talk) 16:19, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

Good. Than I assume that sourcing that won't be an issue as well. And my guess, this are a limited number of references, which are just copied many times. -- Kim van der Linde ^{at venus} 16:45, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

As you are no doubt aware the references are listed under each species description each on its seperate page. Thay have been so listed for several years in most cases. DrMicro (talk) 17:03, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

Cool, that means that most of the work has been done already and that makes it an easy task. What I have done is check a few things, and the lists in this article do not match up with the list at the subspecies pages. So, there is an issue. -- Kim van der Linde ^{at venus} 17:45, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

Thank you for that note. I had not checked that the new layout of subgenera was correct. It was correct when I created it but it appears that later modifications have misassigned the species to incorrect subgenera. DrMicro (talk) 18:55, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

It is not your place to make that designation here on the wiki though! That has to take place within a peer-reviewed publication before it is allowable on this page. By making arbitrary placements of the species into subgenera when they have never been placed there officially in a publication is a breach of wp:or and brings into question all uncited statements in the article.--Kevmin § 14:32, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

For the species described after the subgenera have been created although the authors normally will designate the subgenus in thier paper they do not always do so. As to why they do not I do not suggest a reason. if wikipedia were to follow your suggestion then the editors here would have to locate all the taxonomic changes in species names since the time of Linnaeus. This includes the plant genera that you quote earlier. This policy does not seem to be the practice on wikipedia. While it might be admirable in itszeal historical accuracy this might make it a tad difficlt to write much about any species here at all. DrMicro (talk) 15:17, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

Conerning the newly 'uncited' sections might I refer you to the Wikipedia policy on 'the sky is blue'. The subgenera classification was developed by Garnham in his 1966 book on the Hameosporida which is cited in the references. There have been some minor revisions of this scheme since and these are also referenced. DrMicro (talk) 15:19, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

AN/I notice

I have asked for an administrator to intervene and request DrMicro to pause in editing this article for a while. I think that the small group of editors here can create a useful list in this article or linked, if DrMicro gives us some breathing space.

In the meantime, I ask other editors to disengage from DrMicro, as this discussion is not progressing. Sorry for those of you who disagree with my actions, and also apologize if it doesn't work. However, this discussion is wasting editing time. --Kleopatra (talk) 17:16, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

I have given DrMicro an administrative warning not to continue edit-warring. Other editors should feel free to reinstate the consensus version. Looie496 (talk) 17:43, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

Taxobox, general structure and readability

I am going to butt in here for a minute. I have several issues with this article. I think the list of species in the taxobox is useless. Which level of subdivision is added to the taxobox is per the discretion of the editors, but my idea is that that subdivision should be informative. A similar issue arrises with the genus Drosophila, which has 1500+ species. There, the subdivision chosen is the subgenera, which is far more realistic and informative. A separate article with all species deals with that. Anyway, I suggest to use a similar approach here. Keep all genus level info here, and move all subgeneric specific info to the subsequent pages. This article is getting REALLY long and is very very hard to follow and to navigate because of all the levels. By keeping the information in reasonable sized pages covering one specific group without all the details of subgroups is going to work much better in the long run. -- Kim van der Linde ^{at venus} 17:52, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

A similar problem arose with the Taxonomy of Anopheles. There are about 500 species in this genus. They have been divided into a variery of subtaxa. The difficulty with protozoa is that they do not naturally fall into easily definable subgenera. DrMicro (talk) 18:48, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

Well, we than have to think about how we can make this article readable, because at the moment, it is mostly a loose collection of independent facts. Moving at least some info to the subgenera will help, and if there is a list of unassigned species remaining, we can discuss those where appropriate. I am not saying it will be easy, but the current status of the article is getting really messy. -- Kim van der Linde ^{at venus} 18:59, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

A useful start might be putting the species in the correct subgenera when they are known and removing the duplicates. The subgenus listing was modified relatively recently by another editor and tt appears a number of mistakes were made. DrMicro (talk) 19:55, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

Agreed. And source those. The main problem is that things are not sourced other than a general this book or that article, which is obviously not enough. -- Kim van der Linde ^{at venus} 21:00, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

The subgenera are I believe only properly described in two books and one review article. The most important of these by some margin is Garnham's book on the Haemosporia. The article is one by Sam Telford junior where he has updated the taxonomy of the reptile subgenera. The second book is a relatively recent one on the plasmodia of birds. DrMicro (talk) 21:18, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

Sounds good and very sourceble. -- Kim van der Linde ^{at venus} 21:24, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

These as previously noted are already in the references. DrMicro (talk) 21:41, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

Sorry, just have these as general references is not going to cut it. Because of the issues with what species is assigned to a subgenera and which one not, inline citations are really needed. -- Kim van der Linde ^{at venus} 22:42, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

Species or subgenera

Ok, I would like to hear from editors what they prefer in the taxobox. Species or subgenera?-- Kim van der Linde ^{at venus} 17:54, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

I don't think a vote is going to be necessary - the consensus has already been established that subgenera are preferable. SmartSE (talk) 17:56, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

Okay, true, but sometimes, doing such a straw poll might be good to get that consensus in a single place so that it is easily referred to later when the issue arises again. -- Kim van der Linde ^{at venus} 18:00, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

Subgenera

1. Too many species, but I would like to have a species count for each subgenus included. -- Kim van der Linde ^{at venus} 17:54, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

1. I agree with Kim van der Linde and as I have stated before subgenera in the taxobox with species list in teh articles text.--Kevmin § 22:05, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

There are about 150 species without a designated subgenus. How will these be accomadated?

They are considered incertae sedis as to subgenus placement and as such can be listed so in the "species by subgenus" section, problem solved.--Kevmin § 22:05, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

All sounds fine as subgenera are recognized for this genus. --Kleopatra (talk) 04:39, 24 November 2010 (UTC)

Side Commentary on Eimeria

As I have mentioned before Eimeria has about 1700 species and no recognised subgenera. I would be most interested to know how these should be accomadated. DrMicro (talk) 18:42, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

In cases with many species and no sensible subdivision, a note can be made in the taxobox referring to the text. Look around, it is done often. As for the unassigned species in this genus, we can think of something that is more sensible than this HUGE list, for example making a group unassigned and link to the place those are discussed. -- Kim van der Linde ^{at venus} 18:56, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

There may be a misunderstanding the note above. There are no unassigned species in Eimeria. There are simply no recognised subgenera. This matter has been discussed in the literature but no one to date has had the nerve to try. DrMicro (talk) 19:52, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

Sorry, I though this was the plasmodium article? -- Kim van der Linde ^{at venus} 21:01, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

This is indeed the Plasmodium article. But there are similar problems with other protozoa as I have mentioned. These include Sarcocystis, Leukocytozoon and Haemaoproteus. Since we are in the process of dealing with ~150 species with no assignable subgenus in Plasmodium these other genera have the similar numbers of speces with no recognised subgenus. This problem is most acute with Eimeria given that it is one of the largest genera in biology without recognised subdivisions. I am most interested in suggestions. DrMicro (talk) 21:14, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

I would suggest a separate article called List of Eimeria species to resolve that. -- Kim van der Linde ^{at venus} 21:22, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

It may be I am missing something here but I fail to see how that is an improvement on the taxobox. DrMicro (talk) 21:43, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

Readability and purpose. A long list of names is only of interest to a very very selected few like yourself. It also deflates the purpose of a taxobox, and that is to provide a quick overview to the taxonomy of a specific taxon. Listing the name of the 274 taxa included in that taxon is not improving that purpose, in fact it is doing the opposite. The species contained in the taxon is not a aspect of the taxon. The characteristics that describe that taxon are not altered when another species is added. It does not suddenly move to another family or that. Anyway, the good thing is that this is here no problem as plasmodium has a better suitable subdivision available. -- Kim van der Linde ^{at venus} 13:09, 24 November 2010 (UTC)

This tread should be moved to the Eimeria page.--Kevmin § 22:05, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

The problem is virually the same for all these genera and it all likelyhood several others. This page is as good (or as bad) a place to solve it.DrMicro (talk) 22:30, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

A list of species is fine. If there are not subgenera, it is not our job to create them, alphabetical is a default if no evolutionary placement is given in the literature. --Kleopatra (talk) 04:40, 24 November 2010 (UTC)

Mosquito required or not?

The introduction states "The parasite always has two hosts in its life cycle: a mosquito vector and a vertebrate host.", but this is later contradicted by "It is worth noting, however, that for some species the vector may not be a mosquito.[citation needed]". At least one of the sentences should be reworded so that they agree. Mreftel (talk)

Well spotted. This has now been corrected. The vector is usually a mosquito but a few species exist where the vector is not a mosquito. These are not generally considered to be important. DrMicro (talk) 16:40, 13 March 2012 (UTC)