''Opisthorchis'' is a genus of
fluke
Fluke may refer to:
Biology
* Fluke (fish), a species of marine flatfish
* Fluke (tail), the lobes of the tail of a cetacean, such as dolphins or whales, ichthyosaurs, mosasaurs, plesiosaurs, and metriorhynchids.
* Fluke (flatworm), parasiti ...
s
[ in the family ]Opisthorchiidae
Opisthorchiidae is a family of digenean trematodes. Opisthorchiidae have cosmopolitan distribution.
The most medically important species in the family Opisthorchiidae are '' Clonorchis sinensis'', ''Opisthorchis viverrini'', and ''Opisthorchis f ...
.
Species
Species in the genus ''Opisthorchis'' include:
* '' Opisthorchis chabaudi'' Bourgat & Kulo, 1977 [ ]
* '' Opisthorchis felineus'' (Rivolta, 1884) [
* '' Opisthorchis gomtii'' Mehra, 1941 ][
* '' Opisthorchis parasiluri'' Long & Lee ][
* '' Opisthorchis viverrini'' Poirier, 1886
The species known as '']Clonorchis sinensis
''Clonorchis sinensis'', the Chinese liver fluke, is a liver fluke belonging to the class Trematoda, phylum Platyhelminthes. It infects fish-eating mammals, including humans. In humans, it infects the common bile duct and gall bladder, feeding on ...
'' has sometimes been reclassified into the genus ''Opisthorchis''.
Etymology
From the Greek
Greek may refer to:
Greece
Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe:
*Greeks, an ethnic group.
*Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family.
**Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor ...
opisthen (behind) and orchis (testicle), Opisthorchis is a genus of trematode
Trematoda is a class of flatworms known as flukes. They are obligate internal parasites with a complex life cycle requiring at least two hosts. The intermediate host, in which asexual reproduction occurs, is usually a snail. The definitive h ...
flatworms whose testes
A testicle or testis (plural testes) is the male reproductive gland or gonad in all bilaterians, including humans. It is homologous to the female ovary. The functions of the testes are to produce both sperm and androgens, primarily testoste ...
are located in the posterior end of the body. Sebastiano Rivolta is generally credited with discovering the first opisthorchid, which he named Distoma felineus, in a cat in Italy in 1884. However, the fluke may have been mentioned by Karl Rudolphi in 1819, and in 1831, Gurlt published a textbook that included a drawing of a fluke that was almost certainly Opisthorchis. By the end of the 19th century, Distoma contained so many species that Raphaël Blanchard
Raphaël Anatole Émile Blanchard (28 February 1857 – 7 February 1919) was a French physician and naturalist who was a pioneer of medical zoology, with studies on parasites ranging from protozoa to worms and insects.
Blanchard was born in Saint ...
introduced the genus Opisthorchis for elongated flat flukes with testes in the posterior end of the body. He chose Rivolta's Opisthorchis felineus as the type species.
See also
* List of parasites (human)
References
''Includes public domain text from the CDC as cited''
External links
*
Digenea genera
{{Trematoda-stub