Toxo
rskloot | January 5, 2009A lot of people probably look at the video I've posted below and think, Awh, it's a hilarious rat who just loves his friend the cat! But when I watch it, I can't help imagining something evolutionarily larger.
Some background information: The parasite Toxoplasma infects many species (including an estimated 60 million people in the US), but it can only undergo sexual reproduction in cat digestive tracts. Evolutionarily speaking, this means toxo's survival depends 100% on its host being eaten by a cat (even if its host is human; more on that below the jump). So toxo has evolved a…