Smith G, Grenfell B T
Parasitology. 1984 Feb;88 ( Pt 1):97-104. doi: 10.1017/s0031182000054378.
Experimental studies on the survival of Fasciola hepatica miracidia show no evidence that miracidial mortality varies with the pH of the medium, at least in the range 6.0-8.0. On the other hand, miracidial mortality is shown to vary with both the temperature of the medium and the age of the larvae. The mean expected life-span of the miracidium decreases from about 35 h at 6 degrees C to about 6 h at 25 degrees C. The Gompertz survival function provides a good description of the miracidial survivorship curves over the range of temperatures used, and we describe a maximum likelihood method of estimating the mean values of the parameters of this function, together with their approximate 95% confidence limits.
