[Taxacom] Chimps and humans

[Kenneth Kinman]

Dear All.
      I was told offline that there was a recent paper on the subject of
chimp and human malaria.  I just found that it was published online on
03 August 2009 in Proc. National Acad. Sciences, by Rich et al.
     The results of their study indicates that Plasmodium reichenowi
(the cause of malaria in chimpanzees is actually paraphyletic with
respect to P. falciparum (the most deadly form of malaria in humans).
Since these Plasmodium species are apparently not sister species at all,
that makes me now wonder whether or not Plasmodium parasites can
directly shed light on the supposed sister relationship between chimps
and humans.  Perhaps other parasites would be more useful.  In any case,
I find nothing at all in malarial parasites showing a human-orangutan
relationship (on the contrary, they indicate that malaria in orangutans
may have been directly inherited from a common ancestor with gibbons).
       ---------Ken Kinman