presented in Fig. 14.7, with the species of interest indicated. Examination
of this tree reveals no pattern for the virulent vs. avirulent lizard
malaria species. The most virulent,P. mexicanum, is a sister species of
P. chiricahuae. Recent studies by Foufopoulos (1999) on mountain spiny
lizards (Sceloporus jarrovi) infected with P. chiricahuae in Arizona
reveals no effects of infection on male spiny lizards, but a reduction in
body condition and clutch size of females.P. floridense, an avirulent
species, is most closely related to theP. chiricahuae+P. mexicanumpair.
P. agamae and P. giganteum are sister taxa, as are P. ‘red’ and
P. azurophilum.These two pairs of species are more closely related than
each is to P. floridense or P. mexicanum, and yet P. ‘red’ and
P. azurophilumare low-virulent species andP. agamaeandP. giganteum
are more virulent. Overall, the virulent parasites do not cluster, and
neither do the avirulent species.
304 J.J. Schall
Haemoproteus
P. agamae
P. ‘red’
P. azurophilum
P. chiricahuae
P. mexicanum
P. floridense
P. giganteum
Bird Plasmodium
Bird Plasmodium
Bird Plasmodium
Bird Plasmodium
Bird Plasmodium
P. fairchildi
Bird Plasmodium
Bird Plasmodium
Bird Plasmodium
Bird Plasmodium
Lizard Plasmodium (Brazil)
Fig. 14.7. Phylogeny for lizard and bird malaria parasites (extracted from a larger
phylogeny recovered from cytochrome b sequences for 52 parasite taxa) (Perkins
and Schall, 2002)). The outgroup for this tree are species ofHaemoproteus, another
group of malaria parasites, from lizards and birds. Species ofPlasmodiumisolated
from bird hosts are indicated as ‘BirdPlasmodium’ on the tree. Other taxa on the
tree arePlasmodiumisolated from lizards. Species discussed in this review are
indicated in bold.