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The propensity of nematodes to live inside other organisms is described in a poetic, but somewhat exaggerated, 1914 quote from the ‘father of nematology’, Nathan Augustus Cobb:
If all the matter in the universe except the nematodes were swept away, our world would still be dimly recognizable, and if, as disembodied spirits, we could then investigate it, we should find its mountains, hills, vales, rivers, lakes and oceans represented by a thin film of nematodes. The location of towns would be decipherable, since for every massing of human beings there would be a corresponding massing of certain nematodes.
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