This Week in Parasitism
TWiP is a monthly netcast about eukaryotic parasites. Vincent Racaniello and Dickson Despommier, science Professors from Columbia University, deconstruct parasites, how they cause illness, and how you can prevent infections.
- Update frequency
- every 24 days
- Average duration
- 84 minutes
- Episodes
- 264
- Years Active
- 2009 - 2025
TWiP 64: Three new ways to prevent malaria
Hosts: Vincent Racaniello and Dickson Despommier
Vincent and Dickson review three novel approaches to antimalarial chemotherapy.
Links for this episode:- Targeting PI(4)K to eliminate malaria (Nature…
TWiP 63: Plasmodium of the apes
Hosts: Vincent Racaniello and Dickson Despommier
Vincent and Dickson discuss evidence that the malaria parasite originated in gorillas.
Links for this episode:- Great apes and zoonoses (Science)
- Sour…
TWiP 62: More bats out of hell
Hosts: Vincent Racaniello and Dickson Despommier
Vincent and Dickson discuss the high diversity of malaria parasites in West African bats, and a vaccine against hookworm.
Links for this episode:- Hig…
TWiP 61: Some creep crept into the crypt and crapped
Hosts: Vincent Racaniello and Dickson Despommier
Vincent and Dickson review examples of paleoparasitology, the detection of parasites in archaeological material.
Links for this episode:
TWiP 60: Urine a game of cat and mouse
Hosts: Vincent Racaniello and Dickson Despommier
Vincent and Dickson discuss how infection with Toxoplasma gondii causes mice to lose their aversion to cat urine, even after the parasites have been c…
TWiP 59: Apicomplexity
Hosts: Vincent Racaniello and Dickson Despommier
Vincent and Dickson update the multistate outbreak of cyclosporiasis, discuss the avian malaria parasite P. lophurae, and review protection against ma…
TWiP 58: People, parasites, and plowshares
Hosts: Vincent Racaniello and Dickson Despommier
Guest: Cali Despommier
Vincent and Dickson update the multistate outbreak of cyclosporiasis, and Dickson reads a chapter from his new book.
Links for …
TWiP 57: An outbreak of cyclosporiasis
Hosts: Vincent Racaniello and Dickson Despommier
Vincent and Dickson review a multistate outbreak of cyclosporiasis caused by the single-celled coccidian parasite Cyclospora cayetanensis.
The day aft…
TWiP 56: Whirling disease
Hosts: Vincent Racaniello and Dickson Despommier
Vincent and Dickson discuss Myxobolus cerebralis, the parasite that causes whirling disease of salmonids.
Links for this episode:
TWiP 55: A ladybird's weapon
Hosts: Vincent Racaniello and Dickson Despommier
Vincent and Dickson reveal how invasive harlequin ladybirds use biological weapons against their competitors.
Links for this episode:- Invasive Harleq…
TWiP 54: Unde venis?
Hosts: Vincent Racaniello and Dickson Despommier
Vincent and Dickson consider a case history of a young man with Blastocystis hominis - is it causing his disease?
Links for this episode:
TWiP 53: Anti-saliva immunity
Hosts: Vincent Racaniello and Dickson Despommier
Vincent and Dickson discuss the finding that immunity to a sandfly salivary protein protects against fatal visceral leishmaniasis in hamsters.
Links f…
TWiP 52: Not your ordinary unsegmented roundworm
Hosts: Vincent Racaniello and Dickson Despommier
Vincent and Dickson review the life cycle and pathogenesis of the giant kidney worm, Dioctophyme renale.
Links for this episode:- Dioctophymiasis (CDC…
TWiP 51: Modifying mosquitoes with Anthony A. James
Hosts: Vincent Racaniello and Dickson Despommier
Guest: Anthony A. James
Special guest Anthony A. James joins Vincent and Dickson to discuss how mosquitoes can be genetically modified to control infe…
TWiP 50: Antagonism in the mosquito midgut
Hosts: Vincent Racaniello and Dickson Despommier
Vincent and Dickson reveal how malaria parasites avoid lysis by complement in the mosquito.
Links for this episode:- Malaria parasites co-opt factor H…
TWiP 49: Making sense of toxo and heme
Hosts: Vincent Racaniello and Dickson Despommier
Vincent and Dickson discuss innate immune sensing of Toxoplasma gondii in mice, and heme metabolism in protozoan parasites.
Links for this episode:
TWiP 48: A parasitic cloaking device
Hosts: Vincent Racaniello, Dickson Despommier, and Josef Sabo
Vincent, Dickson, and Josef discuss tetraspanins on the surface of schistosomes as vaccine candidates and immune evasion proteins.
Links …
TWiP 47: For whom the trich tolls
Hosts: Vincent Racaniello and Dickson Despommier
Vincent and Dickson review evidence that a virus of the protozoan parasite Trichomonas vaginalis may exacerbate disease.
Links for this episode:- Endo…
TWiP 46: Malaria gets the (zinc) finger
Hosts: Vincent Racaniello and Dickson Despommier
Vincent and Dickson meet with Judith Straimer and Marcus Lee to discuss their method for site-specific genome editing in Plasmodium falciparumusing zi…
TWiP 45: Free range Toxoplasma with John Boothroyd
Hosts: Vincent Racaniello and Dickson Despommier
Vincent and Dickson discuss Toxoplasma biology with Stanford University Professor John Boothroyd.
Links for this episode:- T. gondii and free range a…