Research Interests

Research in our laboratory addresses problems of parasite ecology, with a focus on processes that determine the distribution and numbers of symbiotic organisms among host species. We have used a number of different systems, but most often these have involved the helminth communities of frogs and small fish, insects and their gregarine parasites, and more recently, nematomorphs. My students typically do problems that integrate host specificity, development, and transmission. Much of our work is done using the Cedar Point Biological Station as a base of operation.

Current projects include the following: movement of parasites through ecosystems and determinants of population and community structure, with a focus on the parasites of amphibians and reptiles (Matthew Bolek and Gabriel Langford), determinants of community and population structure in Monogenoidea of minnows in flowing waters (Alaine Knipes), and a variety of taxonomic and developmental studies on the gregarine parasites of insects, expecially beetles. There are also a number of undergraduates who do research in our lab; most of their projects concern the biology of gregarine parasites. Honors thesis projects from recent years include the dynamics of carbohydrate accumulation in different gregarine cell compartments, host specificity of actinocephalid gregarines in odonates, and distribution of Monogenea on the gills of centrarchid fishes.

Recent Publications

• Janovy, J. Jr. 2004. On becoming a biologist, 2nd Ed. University of Nebraska Press, Lincoln, NE. 153p.
• Janovy, J. Jr. 2003. Teaching in Eden: the Cedar Point lessons. Routledge Falmer, New York, NY. 187p.
• Janovy, J. 2002. Defining the field: Concurrent infections and the community ecology of helminth parasites. J. Parasitol., 88 (3): 440-445. (invited review)
• Bolek, M.G.J. Janovy, Jr., and A.R. Irizarry-Rovira. 2003. Observations on the life histroy and descriptions of coccidia (Apicomplexa) from the western chorus frog, Pseudacris triseriata triseriata, from eastern Nebraska. J. Parasitol., 89:522-528.
• Collins, M.R., and J. Janovy, Jr. 2003. Host specificity among Ancyrocephalineae (Monogenoidea) of Nebraska sunfish. J. Parasitol. 89:80-83.
• Hanelt B, Janovy J. 2002. Morphometric analysis of nonadult characters of common species of American gordiids (Nematomorpha : Gordioidea). JOURNAL OF PARASITOLOGY 88 (3): 557-562.
• Cook TJP, Janovy J, Clopton RE. 2001. Epimerite-host epithelium relationships among eugregarines parasitizing the damselflies Enallagma civile and Ischnura verticalis. JOURNAL OF PARASITOLOGY 87 (5): 988-996.
• Wise MR, Janovy J, Wise JC. 2000. Host specificity in Metamera sillasenorum, n. sp, a gregarine parasite of the leech Helobdella triserialis with notes on transmission dynamics. JOURNAL OF PARASITOLOGY 86 (3): 602-606.
• Weichman MA, Janovy J. 2000. Parasite community structure in Pimephales promelas (Pisces : Cyprinidae) from two converging streams. JOURNAL OF PARASITOLOGY 86 (3): 654-656.
• Hanelt, B., and J. Janovy, Jr. 1999. The life cycle of a horsehair worm, Gordius robustus (Nematomorpha: Gordioidea). Journal of Parasitology 85: 139-141.