Talk:Toxoplasma gondii/Archive 1

Plagarism
It appears that some sections of this article were directly copied from a recently Slashdot listed Yahoo article. --User:Overand 09:44, 12 February 2006 (UTC)


 * Yup, I'll change it. AxelBoldt 22:00, 12 February 2006 (UTC)

One gene, 90% responsible for making TG dangerous
They are working to find other genes responsible. Brian Pearson 06:49, 19 December 2006 (UTC)

Alley Cats & Sex Kittens
Could someone please get hold of the Alley Cats & Sex Kittens article from Australasian Science magazine and check it out? The blurb reads:

"One of the most common human parasite infections in the world can affect our mental state, including our sexual attractiveness, IQ, schizophrenia and the likelihood of being in a car accident. Nicky Boulter reports."

I think there may be more in this article that would be good to add to the Wikipedia article than I am currently aware of at this time :) Mattabat 11:32, 26 December 2006 (UTC)


 * The article is what got me interested in this page - but it is not a scientific article. The article reads like a tabloid and its conclusions is based on ify statistics. Besides, its mentioned in the main article - this page should not go into the details of toxoplasmosis. It should be giving a summary of whats in toxoplasmosis. Fresheneesz 22:33, 30 December 2006 (UTC)

Quick question(s)....
Um...wasn't there a "live-science"article about toxoplasma gondii??? And, is it true that T.G. affects half the world's human population? Another thing...if T.G. has effects on humans and mice/rats, what about birds and other animals? Finally....has T.G. considered taking over the world?! (Just kidding. ;P )--Wolfluv1 (talk) 00:21, 3 January 2008 (UTC)

In macrophages?
Can someone provide a reference to the claim that Tg enter Macrophages? I haven't seen it anywhere else. In a NYT piece Carl Zimmer elaborates on their relation with Dendritic cells, so maybe someone confused the two. I will return to correct this if there will be no response. trespassers william (talk) 20:07, 6 March 2008 (UTC)

Merge from Tachyzoite, Tachyzoites and Bradyzoite
All of the above articles are approximately two years old and contain relatively or very little content. Two of them form a redundant pair, and all have subject matter which seems most relevant in the context of this article (Toxoplasma gondii). I have therefore suggested a merge from all three of the above articles into this one. People's thoughts? Robin S 23:43, 25 July 2007 (UTC)
 * I agree that the first two are completely redundant and should be merged with each other, but I'd oppose a merger of the other two into this article. --Arcadian 02:54, 5 August 2007 (UTC)
 * How about into another article, such as Coccidia (broken link from Tachyzoites)? There may be more than one possible destination article for the merge, but I don't think that the above three still deserve their own articles if they still haven't grown significantly after so long. Robin S 13:03, 5 August 2007 (UTC)
 * I oppose merging all of the articles, but tachyzoite and tachyzoites should be merged with each other. Merging the other terms into this article is like merging "antler" and "ungulate" with the mule deer article--they should really stay separate.TeamZissou 05:48, 1 October 2007 (UTC)

Wow, that merge tag had been there for a while. Per the apparent consensus above, I have merged Tachyzoites and Tachyzoite together and removed the merge tags from all the articles. —Ilmari Karonen (talk) 21:22, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

editing
I was going to a link to Motile but I figured it would deleted anyway so I'll just suggest it here and let someone else add and delete it. Eagleapex (talk) 13:15, 3 September 2008 (UTC)

How-to
I have, twice now, removed the how-to-avoid-toxoplasmosis how-to; it isn't because I callously want to spread diseases among pregnant women: first, this is an article about the organism, T. gondii, not about the disease, toxoplasmosis (a proposal to merge them seems to have been rejected, which actually makes good sense to me: biological and medical approaches can differ too much for a single article). The second is that the Wikipedia policy about how-to isn't limited to style: please read [What Wikipedia is not] before reverting. Complainer (talk) 18:50, 4 September 2009 (UTC)

http://www.metafilter.com/81370/Beware-of-Cat —Preceding unsigned comment added by 85.102.202.130 (talk) 01:23, 4 May 2009 (UTC)

Wording identical to source
Two sentences in the Toxoplasmosis section are, except for a couple of trivial changes, lifted straight from source 14. The sentences from that section are:

"Additionally, studies of students and conscript soldiers in the Czech Republic in the mid-1990s highlighted the fact that infected people showed different personality traits to uninfected people—and that the differences depended on sex. Infected women were more likely to become more outgoing and showed signs of higher intelligence, while men became aggressive, jealous and suspicious."

The original article says:

"There are fewer experiments in humans, but results from studies of students and conscript soldiers in the Czech Republic in the mid-1990s highlighted the fact that infected people showed different personality traits to non-infected people - and that the differences depended on sex. Infected men were more likely to be aggressive, jealous and suspicious, while women became more outgoing and showed signs of higher intelligence" (http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2003/sep/25/medicineandhealth.thisweekssciencequestions1).

I'm really new to Wikipedia editing, and I don't have time right now to find out the Wikipedia policy on re-using text, but I'd assume that this is something that should be paraphrased.

Ranetz (talk) 05:21, 26 March 2010 (UTC)

Yeah, that text should be removed. Paraphrasing would be best in the long term, but the immediate responsibility is to remove plagiarism, whatever the cost to the article. 140.254.1.247 (talk) 18:15, 18 September 2010 (UTC)

Text removed. Replacing lost information is not my responsibility. 140.254.1.247 (talk) 18:18, 18 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Thank you very much for being bold and removing the copyright violation. --Danger (talk) 18:29, 18 September 2010 (UTC)

Infected Rats Find Cat Urine Sexy
There is new info that could be added related to the life cycle. Apparently the Protozoa changes rat brain chemistry to make them seek out cats, leading to more infected cats.

The study is referenced in the following article: http://www.sciencenews.org/view/generic/id/333769/title/News_in_Brief_Body_%2B_Brain Berkland (talk) 11:53, 26 August 2011 (UTC)
 * This is already covered in the section "Toxoplasmosis". The study does indicate that the parasite may work by altering the reproductive behavior pathways in the brain, but I'm inclined to wait for further corroboration before adding this to the article, since the study is somewhat limited. (For future reference, this is the actual paper: ) Danger (talk) 12:26, 26 August 2011 (UTC)

Cat lovers
I'd like to see a study to find out if infection with this causes a human to like being around cats more. WAS 4.250 17:48, 12 February 2006 (UTC)
 * Considering what it does to rats, I wouldn't be surprised at all if it, at least, reduced your -fear- of cats (I've known people deathly afraid of housecats). —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.73.70.113 (talk) 04:24, 23 June 2008 (UTC)
 * You know those crazy old women who keep a ton of cats in their home? Like the one in The Simpsons? To me it would make perfect sense if they were infected by Toxoplasma gondii. Can humans be tested for it? I'd love to see a study on this. (Edit: I've now arrived at the Toxoplasmosis article and found more info there.)

Minitrue (talk) 04:41, 1 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Cracked article "6 Things You Didn't Know You Could Get Addicted To" refers to an insinuation of this by the NY Times, but alas, they did not source that claim with a link Piepants (talk) 17:34, 30 August 2011 (UTC)Piepants

higher guilt proneness, not lower. Source inconsistent

 * The abstract of Flegr and Havlícek states that young women with latent toxoplasmosis have lower guilt proneness. However, please read the article itself. The body text repeatedly states just the opposite. The latter is also more consistent with other sources. Peacock.Lane (talk) 06:10, 2 December 2010 (UTC)


 * Seconded. I want to edit the article accordingly, as it seems very clear from the study that women had increased apprehensiveness (guilt-proneness.) 71.60.227.208 (talk) 17:58, 24 October 2011 (UTC)
 * The change has already been made. Danger (talk) 18:34, 25 October 2011 (UTC)

Citation does not seem to support article.
I've been trying to track down studies that support the claim in the article "The sexual part of the life cycle (coccidia like) takes place only in cats" (emphasis added) and have as yet been unsuccessful. Citated in the article:

Toxoplasmosis Research Institute & Center

The above linked article certainly voices an assumption that feline intestines are the only place that T. gondii can sexually reproduce, but offers no proof or evidence. Indeed, the above linked article contains the statement "It would simultaneously reveal much about what makes felines the exclusive definitive host (or are they really such for all strains of Toxoplasma)?"

This statement suggests that not only does the linked article not establish feline intestines as the sole environment in which T. gondii can sexually reproduce, but that the linked article's author is unaware of any study establishing that assumption as a fact.

Until such a study can be identified (or conducted), shouldn't the claim that cats' guts are the sole breeding ground for T. gondii be struck from the parent article?

Protocolor (talk) 20:47, 29 December 2011 (UTC)


 * No because it is the only known site of the sexual part of the life cycle. The citation I added says, for example, "very little has been done concerning the sexual stages since they can only be studied in vivo in cats", which supports the statement. WP:RS prefers secondary and tertiary sources and I have cited a review from a peer reviewed academic journal.  To remove the statement, would go against mainstream views. To question it, might go against WP:NOR and WP:NPOV. Graham Colm (talk) 21:06, 29 December 2011 (UTC)

Slight Clarification on Host
Slight clarification of how this gets into human hosts. A frequent pathway for Toxoplasma gondii is not by humans ingesting cat or rodents or whatnot, that have the cysts in the tissue...that might happen, but it's not the most common thing people do that results in ingestion of this parasite. A really common way that people get this is because they inhale the oocysts in the cat litter, when they change the litter. The oocysts get cleared along with mucous, ingested that way, and then go to the muscle, brain, etc. The oocysts which are in cat litter, only take about 1-5 days to sporulate and become infective in the environment. Oocyst become tachyzoites shortly after being ingested.

Center for Disease Control http://dpd.cdc.gov/dpdx/html/Toxoplasmosis.htm 192.33.240.95 (talk) 16:38, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

fascinating stuff in the NYT / Atlantic
Follow the first link, the one to the Times -- it's absolutely fascinating stuff, and could be added to the article (of course w/ proper respect for copyright).
 * I'd say the Atlantic article is better and more recent, but again would need someone to follow the researchers' names to the actual studies for citation here. 101.229.79.243 (talk) 00:37, 11 February 2012 (UTC)

LSD?
The Straight Dope says T. Gondii might produce LSD. I want to hear more about that. —Keenan Pepper 16:21, 12 February 2006 (UTC)

'''Behavioral modifications of the host Main article: Toxoplasmosis'''

Quite frankly this have not been proved. No one has ever (either) proved connection between a 'particle' and mental illness. Having read this I found it quite fanciful.

Independet here means... loose pieces of evidence without consideration to 'provenience' concocted togheter to make a case.


 * A mouse that is attracted to cat urine is pretty definitively mentally ill.WolfKeeper 15:06, 26 March 2006 (UTC)
 * There's no direct link between conventional mental illness and Toxoplasmosis, but it does seem to sometimes cause schizophrenic illnesses; if (I believe the current evidence suggests) not actual schizophrenia. Toxoplasmosis does causes the body to attack its own tissues to try to kill the bug, because the bug targets nerves this can lead to blindness and other nerve damage.WolfKeeper 15:06, 26 March 2006 (UTC)


 * Check out the Times article linked from this article -- it talks abot mice being attracted to cats.

I just ran into an article today 2/17/2012 that made it look like at least very pursuasive evidence has been gathered that human behaviour is altered in infected individuals. Is the article, in Atlantic Magazine,  www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2012/03/how-your-cat-is-making-you-crazy/8873/  misrepresenting the studies involved?1p2o3i (talk) 06:39, 17 February 2012 (UTC)

Suggested addition or alternate introduction
There is a notice criticising the introduction as being too technical. Here is my alternative.

T.gondii are similar to humans and other mammals, in that they combine two individuals DNA to create a new person. In mammals, it is the sperm cell which combines DNA with the egg's DNA. The difference with T.gondii is that this can only happen when it is living in a cat. When it is living on other hosts, such as rodents, no sexual reproduction can occur. After sexual reproduction of a new individual, a new cell will make many new cells, all with the same DNA. In the case of mammals like us, from these identical cells we develop large bodies with specialized organs. In the case of T.gondii, the new cells reproduced are independent fully functional cells, but these do not cooperate and produce large bodies. Instead they function alone, reproducing asexually as we do except as described above. End of suggested text. Comments please. Idealist707 (talk) 19:51, 19 August 2011 (UTC)
 * I appreciate your efforts. However, this text oversimplifies the organism's complex lifecycle and includes unnecessary explanations of vertebrate reproduction that aren't appropriate for an article discussing T. gondii specifically (that's why we have wikilinks, afterall). This might be appropriate for Simple English Wikipedia, but we need to provide all the relevant details here, including technical language. I can't really think of a good way to additionally simplify that paragraph without excluding detail. Danger (talk) 09:00, 20 August 2011 (UTC)

I have no technical training and this article seems pretty accessible. The unfamiliar elements seem well linked to explanatory articles, and the gist seems to come into focus quite well, at least for me. I wouldn't wantr to see such an article dumbed down.1p2o3i (talk) 06:39, 17 February 2012 (UTC)

Effect on Humans
Should there be a section for its effect on humans? Getting a hold of the academic paper this newspaper article is about might be a good citation. http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/DyeHard/story?id=2288095&page=1#.TzwlzsWiHsR — Preceding unsigned comment added by Gsonnenf (talk • contribs) 21:43, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

Considering it's behaviour changing effects, does this count as "posession"? Are bacteria, viruses & other microbes, what they refer to as demons? Jesus said do not live in filth, it breeds demons. The Quran talks about invisible demons of the earth, air & water, that they're everywhere. What's invisible, and causes disease? How many angels can dance on a pinhead? The ancients weren't stupid. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 156.34.178.130 (talk) 14:28, 9 September 2012 (UTC)

Classification
The article refers to Toxoplasma gondii as a parasite. However, seeing as 1. it does not seem to harm cats, 2. infected rodents lose fear of cats, than 3. both organisms benefit from the relationship. Doesn't this qualify Toxoplasma as being in a symbiotic relationship with cats? Wilson (talk) 15:24, 8 October 2012 (UTC)

Depression
The bit about depression is just plain weird. "Intuition would suggest"? Also the Sharot paper says dopamine enhances optimism, so if anything increasing dopamine would decrease depression not cause it. Either way this is a leap that shouldnt be in a Wiki article. Delete this bit please — Preceding unsigned comment added by 128.40.254.123 (talk) 15:05, 24 February 2013 (UTC)

Major edits
I'm a Toxoplasma researcher, and I was hoping to do some major edits on both this article (Toxoplasma gondii) and (although to a lesser degree) on the Toxoplasmosis article. These would include clarifying and correcting information, expanding upon areas where I'm knowledgable, contributing additional sections, and improving a number of references. I'm new to editing wikipedia and I'm not an expert on the etiquette of how major changes should be made, so I apologize if I'm doing it wrong! --Vertdegrece (talk) 23:47, 16 January 2013 (UTC)

Update  03/13/13: I've drafted much of the edits to the page in my Sandbox -- I plan to implement the edits later today or tomorrow. I've rewritten a number of sections to improve clarity, accuracy, and verifiability. There is certainly a TON of Toxoplasma research out there, but much of the information currently in the article focuses and expands upon single findings of primary research; I've tried to renovate and refine the article to make it more Wikipedia appropriate, and the sources I've tried to use are, for the most part, recent major scholarly review texts or review articles about various aspects of Toxoplasma gondii. Thanks! Vertdegrece (talk) 22:44, 13 March 2013 (UTC)

merge?
Should this page and toxoplasmosis be merged? People have been writing separate but parallel information about toxoplasmosis on both page - and its not very efficient. Fresheneesz 22:44, 30 December 2006 (UTC)


 * Yeeeah, the two pages seem like they could use a little cleanup, but I think it's pretty standard to have two separate pages dedicated to both the disease state and the causative organism, e.g. tuberculosis and m. tuberculosis. Zujua (talk) 02:39, 6 July 2012 (UTC)


 * good cleanup Needed indeed, including a better "cross linking" between the two articles.--MarmotteiNoZ 03:54, 28 March 2013 (UTC)

Toxoplasmosis and otters
I'd like to see more about the contamination of marine waters by municipal waste waters where people have flushed cat feces. I believe most municipal water treatment does not affect Toxoplasma gondii. People on Monterey Bay at both the Moss Landing Marine Labs and the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute believe otters have been affected by Toxoplasma gondii. Also, some brands of cat litter are sold as "flushable" so information about this infection source would be important.


 * That'd make an interesting addition! Do you know if there's any published source available that has that info?  Zujua (talk) 02:34, 6 July 2012 (UTC)


 * info added cheers--124.149.124.199 (talk) 10:10, 28 March 2013 (UTC)

nicky boulter
Someone wrote on my talk page:
 * fresheneesz, you said on the discussion for toxoplasma gondii that you had read the article by nicky boulter- is it available online anywhere? all i can find are articles quoting her, with the same 2 or 3 quotes in each one.

In response to that, what I meant was that I read an article about her(?) work - probably one of the ones you've read. Fresheneesz 23:48, 5 January 2007 (UTC)


 * I wonder if this is the article in question. (control.com.au is a web page of Control Publishing, the company behind Australasian Science magazine.) I found it listed here. Apparently it was published in this number of the mag. Palosirkka (talk) 08:26, 30 January 2015 (UTC)

Incorrect interpretation of sources?
The section Toxoplasma gondii now includes the following text:
 * Differences in behaviour observed in infected hosts compared to non-infected individuals have been shown to be sex dependent. Looking at humans, studies using the Cattell’s 16 Personality Factor questionnaire, found that infected men scored lower on Factor G (superego strength/rule consciousness) and higher on Factor L (vigilance) while the opposite pattern was observed for infected women. This means that men were more likely to disregard rule and were more expedient, suspicious and jealous. On the other hand, women were more warm hearted, outgoing, conscientious and moralistic. However, human studies have not been able to show causation as they have all been observational studies.

However, I checked the abstract of the first referenced article, titled "Sex-dependent toxoplasmosis-associated differences in testosterone concentration in humans". This mentions observed sex-linked behavioural differences, but as something others have observed. The study reported in the article is not about behaviour, but (as its title states) about testosterone levels. The authors claim that their study shows that whereas the testosterone level is positively correlated with T.g. infection for men, it is negatively correlated for women. It interprets this as a possible underlying reason for the observed sex-linked behaviour differences. In my opinion, this is at least a contribution to precisely what our present text claims it not to be, namely "a causation" finding. It is far from definitive; inter alia, even if the results of this single study indeed in the future should be confirmed by further studies, it would not explain why the T.g. infection should have converse physiological effects in men and women. However, IMHO, anyhow, it is a clear mistake to refer to [ ] as an "observational study", which our text now implicitly does. JoergenB (talk) 02:54, 25 December 2016 (UTC) References in this text:
 * Just looking through the human behavior section, I think the article as written overstates the evidence for various effects of toxo infection on humans (though I haven't looked thoroughly through the evidence recently, so maybe my impressions are outdated). These claims are medical in nature and should be sourced to reliable medical sources where possible. I think your edits are a big improvement but maybe additional boldness will be required. I'd be happy to help in a week or two when I get a bit more time (though of course, like I said, maybe my head is just in the past). Thanks! Happy editing! Ajpolino (talk) 18:22, 25 December 2016 (UTC)
 * Actually, the content is not purely referring to humane medicine. This article (like many other WP articles I've happened to read) seems to have a double perspective; both a more general biological, and a more specific medical.  In this particular case, we actually also have the specific article toxoplasmosis for the medical aspects.  Therefore, perhaps it is reasonable to report more about the seemingly well-studied and not so controversial findings about the influence of toxoplasma infections on rhodents (or at least on laboratory strains of rhodents), in this article, and report less about humane behaviour influence.  To the extent that the humane medical parts survive the MEDRS criteria, they might be moved to the toxoplasmosis article, and just be very briefly mentioned here, with a further reading link.
 * On the other hand, the main part of Toxoplasmosis might be moved here.
 * Does this sound reasonable? JoergenB (talk) 23:20, 26 December 2016 (UTC)
 * Yup! I agree completely. I think the prose in the "Behavioral differences of infected hosts" section is also overly-detailed about each study it cites. Specific results and p-values etc are probably more than is appropriate for an encyclopedia article.Ajpolino (talk) 04:44, 27 December 2016 (UTC)

I believe treatment is missing
I do not know how to edit wikipedia pages, but I believe treatment for Toxoplasma gondii is lacking in this page, both in pregnant women (also, there is nothing mentioned about the TORCH syndrome associated with Toxoplasma spp) and in eligible patients (patients with an acute symptomatic syndrome, pregnant women with seroconversion, New-Born with congenital Toxoplasmosis and certain inmunosupressed patients). In any case, drug treatment as taught in Med School is: Pirimetamine + Sulfonamides + Folic Acid, or Macrolides (spiramicine) in pregnant women, as well as clindamicine. Perhaps this should be mentioned somewhere in the article?


 * Look at Toxoplasmosis, which is the related disease to this organism.WolfKeeper 00:59, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

OK, but a subject like "treatment" should not be buried in another related article. It should be here too, even if only linked to that section in the other article.

161.98.13.100 (talk) 00:12, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

161.98.13.100 (talk) 00:11, 8 November 2011 (UTC)


 * Some people here in the talk page have noted the inefficiency of having overlapping information on the two pages, and I think there's some value to having this info separated, i.e. the information in the toxoplasmosis page should be the one to describe the disease state is the result of infection, and also treatment options, while this page should be more directly related to the organism itself--you can't treat an organism, after all, but rather you treat the disease. If it's clear that this kind of distinction exists, it should be actually easier to find that information on the other page, IMO. What do you all think? Zujua (talk) 02:45, 6 July 2012 (UTC)


 * Agreed it is "burried" badly..I'll have a go at improving it --MarmotteiNoZ 03:55, 28 March 2013 (UTC)

I came here looking for Treatment but only found "Prevention". Very odd. N0w8st8s (talk) 19:30, 22 October 2014 (UTC)n0w8st8s

Page text says "causes the disease toxoplasmosis", but what is supposed to give me the idea that "the disease toxoplasmosis" *is* the (name of the) T.gondii infection, and not merely one of possibly multiple adverse conditions merely caused by the organism? I don't see anything. If I hadn't come to this Talk page to suggest a "Treatment" section, I still wouldn't know. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.35.58.55 (talk) 20:12, 31 January 2019 (UTC)
 * It should be obvious now that it says "the infectious disease toxoplasmosis" instead of "the disease toxoplasmosis".  Seppi  333  (Insert 2¢) 20:22, 31 January 2019 (UTC)

Is it a bacteria or what?
--TiagoTiago (talk) 10:55, 17 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Per the first sentence in the article, "Toxoplasma gondii is an obligate intracellular, parasitic alveolate that causes the disease toxoplasmosis."
 * In other words, it's a human parasite; specifically, it's a protozoan parasite, and to be even more specific, it's an alveolate. For context, see Pathogen.  Seppi  333  (Insert 2¢) 06:56, 18 January 2018 (UTC)

The answer is no. They are not bacteria. They have only 1 cell, but inside this cell there are for example mitochondria. Mitochondria are speculated to be bacteria ingested by cells. Bacteria don't have mitochondria.

--ee1518 (talk) 15:24, 27 June 2021 (UTC)