Interestingly, until the mid 1970s,
people working in developmental biology frequently confused
C. briggsae
and C. elegans and many of the cultures being used were mis-identified. In the mid 1970s, graduate student Paul Friedman working with
Ed Platzer at UC Riverside
developed diagnostic biochemical criteria for separating the two species and
resolved the confusion (Friedman et al, 1977).
Eggs may hatch within the bodies of older females. The females then die
and the juveniles consume bacteria decomposing the female body. This has
been thought to occur when the vaginal muscles are no longer strong enough to
eject the eggs and is termed
endotokia matricida due
to the resultant death of the female. In the Caenorhabditis elegans
literature, the phenomenon has been termed "bagging" . The hypothesis has
been advanced that intra-uterine hatch is a part of the C. elegans
life cycle, and complements androdioecy ( the existence of a hermaphrodite
population and a male population) and the dauer (a resistant or enduring
stage) stage to enhance progeny survival and dispersal under stress.
Consequently, per the hypothesis, matricidal hatching, has been
perpetuated in C. elegans through evolutionary time as it confers a
survival advantage when resources are scarce or conditions unfavorable (Chen &
Caswell-Chen, 2003).
- Andrassy, I. 1983. A taxonomic review of the suborder Rhabditina (Nematoda:
Secernentia). ORSTOM, Paris.
- Ankeney, R.A. 2001. The natural history of C. elegans research.
Nature Reviews Genetics 2: 474-478.
Brenner, S. 1974. The genetics of Caenorhabditis elegans.
Genetics 77:71-94.
- Brown, A. 2003. In the Beginning Was the Worm. Simon & Schuster,
London. 244p.
Chen J.; Caswell-Chen E.P. 2003. Why Caenorhabditis elegans adults
sacrifice their bodies to progeny. Nematology 5:641-645.
- Dougherty, E.C. 1960. Cultivation of aschelminthes, especially rhabditid
nematodes. Pp 297-318 in Sasser and Jenkins (eds) Nematology: fundamentals
and recent advances. UNC Press, Chapel Hill.
- Dougherty, E.C. and H.G. Calhoun. 1948. Possible significance of
free-living nematodes in genetic research. Nature 161:29.
- Dougherty, E.C. and V. Nigon. 1949. A new species of the
free-living nematode genus Rhabditis of interest in comparative
physiology and genetics. J. Parasitol. 35: 11.
Dougherty, E.C., E.L. Hansen, W.L. Nicholas, J.A. Mollett, and E.A.
Yarwood. 1959. Axenic cultivation of Caenorhabditis briggsae (Nematoda:
Rhabditidae) with unsupplemented and supplemented chemically defined media.
Ann. N.Y. Acad. Sci. 77: 176-217.
- Fatt, H.V. 1961. Genetic control of maturation and reproduction in the
nematode Caenorhabditis elegans. MA Thesis, University of California,
Berkeley. 49p.
- Fatt, H.V. and E.C. Dougherty. 1963. Genetic control of differential heat
tolerance in two strains of the nematode, Caenorhabditis elegans.
Science 141:266-267.
- Friedman, P.A., E.G. Platzer, and J.E. Eby. 1977. Species differentiation in
C. briggsae and C. elegans. J. Nematol. 9: 197-203.
Gems, D. and D. L. Riddle. 1996. Longevity of Caenorhabditis elegans
reduced by mating but not gamete production. Nature 379:723-725.
- Gochnauer, M.B. and E. McCoy. 1954. Responses of a soil nematode, R.
briggsae, to antibiotics. J. Exp. Zool. 125:377-406.
- Kimble, J. and S. Ward. 1988. Germ-line development and fertilization. In: W.
B. Wood et al. The Nematode Caenorhabditis elegans. Cold Spring Harbor
Laboratory Press.
- Maupas, E. 1900. Modes et formes de reproduction des Nématodes. Arch,
Zool. Exp, et Gén., (3e série), 8:463-624.
- Nicholas, W.L., E.C. Dougherty, and E.L. Hansen. 1959. Axenic cultivation of
C. briggsae (Nematoda: Rhabditidae) with chemically undefined supplements;
comparative studies with related nematodes. Ann. N.Y. Acad. Sci. 77:
218-236.
Nigon, V. 1949. Les modalités de la reproduction et le déterminisme du sexe chez
quelques nematodes libres. Ann. Sci. Nat. Zool. Biol. Anim. 11: 1-132.
- Nigon, V. and E.C. Dougherty. 1949. Reproductive patterns and attempts
at reciprocal crossing of Rhabditis elegans Maupas, 1900 and
Rhabditis briggsae Dougherty and Nigon, 1949 (Nematoda: Rhabditidae). J.
Exp Zool, 112:488-503.
- Nigon, V. and E.C. Dougherty. 1950. A dwarf mutant of a nematode. A
morphological mutant of Rhabditis briggsae, a free-living soil
nematode. J. Heredity 41:103-109.
Riddle, D.L., T. Blumenthal, B.J. Meyer and J.R. Priess. 1997. C. elegans
II. Cold Springs Harbor Press.
- Venette, R. C. and H. Ferris. 1997. Thermal constraints to population
growth of bacterial-feeding nematodes. Soil Biology and Biochemistry
29:63-74.
For more information on nematodes:
Go to Nemaplex Main
Menu.