ABOVE: The freshwater mussel Pseudanodonta complanata, listed as vulnerable by the IUCN
DAVID ALDRIDGE
While scientists aren’t exactly sure how many species of microbes inhabit the planet, it’s likely in the tens of millions, the vast majority of which remain entirely undescribed. As a consequence, many researchers, including conservation biologists, carry out their work in ignorance of the viruses, protozoans, and bacteria may be accompanying their target species in relocation projects.
A policy perspective published April 13 in Conservation Letters discusses the scientific rationale for moving species from one place to another, the likelihood that such efforts may also be transporting pathogens, and the factors that dictate whether these microbes become established once released into a new system.
Joshua Brian, a PhD student and community ecologist at the University of Cambridge who coauthored the perspective, researches this issue as part of his dissertation work on the parasites of freshwater mussels, which ...
