New parasites from old fish

Natural history collections preserve a record of biodiversity in time and space within their archives of carefully described and catalogued reference specimens. However, they also contain a further resource; the numerous poorly-known parasitic and symbiot ic taxa collected unwittingly and preserved in situ with their hosts. Many of these smaller organisms have been overlooked without ever attracting attention on their own right. The NHM includes a substantial fish collection from around the world, includi ng areas which have been little sampled for their monogenean fauna. This Yggdrasil project will therefore set out to screen the international fish collection of NHM Oslo, to identify monogenean parasites co-incidentally collected with their hosts, and to describe these using state-of-the-art morphometrics and molecular markers. This project will allow to applicant to extend her skills in this area, and to receive training in the use of molecular methods in taxonomy with particular emphasis on with the suc cessful analysis of degraded DNA.