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. 2017 Jul 6;7:292. doi: 10.3389/fcimb.2017.00292

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Copyright © 2017 Ren and Gupta.

This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

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Abridged phylogenetic tree depicting main super-phyla of the kingdom protozoa, namely Alveolata and Excavata. Two of the all shown phyla, Apicomplexa, and Kinetoplastida, comprise a vast majority of human and animal pathogens. Only the selected genera representing each class are displayed. While most apicomplexans (except for gregarines) favor an intracellular lifestyle, kinetoplastids prefer an extracellular life (barring certain stages of T. cruzi and Leishmania). Besides, apicomplexan parasites exhibit well-defined asexual as well as sexual reproduction, whereas the latter phase is not yet known in most kinetoplastids. Individual genera or even species have evolved a notably distinct lifecycle in specific host organisms, which often involves a perpetual inter-host transmission in nature.