Schistosome population genetic structure: When clumping worms is not just splitting hairs

Schistosomiasis is a major public health problem, affecting over 200 millio n people worldwide. Although Schistosoma mansoni has been studied rigorousl y in an attempt ro provide a vaccine based on a number of candidate antigen s, there has been a lack of complementary effort to determine the range and distribution of variation in representative molecules throughout natural p opulations. Here, Jason Curtis and Dennis Minchella highlight current (and suggest future) research efforts aimed nf assessing genetic variation in sc histosome populations, and call for a more robust consideration of schistos ome population genetics.