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Great Salt Lake roundworm gets Shoshone name – @theU

Representative microbialite mounds at Site 6 from which nematodes were extracted.

News recently published in the Journal of Nematology should give pause for thought to any creationist who imagines that a magical creator made Earth perfectly suited for human life. The report describes the discovery of a new species of nematode — a group of roundworms, some of which are little more than a millimetre long — living under the extreme conditions found in the Great Salt Lake in northern Utah, USA. The species is believed to be endemic to that lake.

Nematodes are the most abundant animal phylum on Earth in both aquatic and terrestrial environments, with around 250,000 described species. It is estimated that roughly 80% of all animal life in terrestrial soils, and about 90% of that on the ocean floor, consists of nematodes. They occur in virtually every environment, from polar ice to deep-sea hydrothermal vents, and, as this newly discovered species demonstrates, in conditions of extreme salinity.

If Earth can be said to be ideally suited for any group of organisms, nematodes would be strong contenders. Humans, by contrast, require a very narrow range of terrestrial conditions in order to survive without specialised technology; consequently, much of the planet is unsuitable for — and often actively hostile to — human life.

Genetic analysis indicates that there may be two distinct populations of this nematode within the lake, raising intriguing questions for biologists: how did they arrive there, and what role do they play in the lake’s ecosystem? This species represents only the third metazoan known to inhabit the lake, the other two being brine shrimp and brine flies. Together, these organisms support vast populations of migratory birds, making the Great Salt Lake a vital feeding ground during migration.

Nematodes^ Diversity, Taxa, and Habitats.
Nematodes (roundworms) form one of the most diverse and abundant animal phyla on Earth. They occupy almost every known environment and include free-living species, parasites, and symbionts.

Major Nematode Groups

Modern nematode taxonomy is complex, but most species fall into three broad ecological groupings:

Free-living nematodes.
Found in soils, freshwater, marine sediments, polar ice, deserts, deep-sea hydrothermal vents, hypersaline lakes, and even inside rock pores. Many feed on bacteria, fungi, algae, or detritus and play a crucial role in nutrient cycling.
Plant-parasitic nematodes.
Common in agricultural soils worldwide. These species infect roots, stems, or leaves and are responsible for major crop losses. They are among the most economically significant animal parasites on the planet.
Animal-parasitic nematodes.
Infect almost every animal group, including insects, fish, reptiles, birds, and mammals — humans included.

Nematodes in the Human Body

Several nematode species are well-adapted to living inside humans, where they complete all or part of their life cycle:

Intestinal parasites (e.g. roundworms, hookworms, whipworms)
Tissue parasites that migrate through muscles, eyes, or organs
Blood and lymphatic parasites, including species that cause elephantiasis

Globally, hundreds of millions of people are infected with parasitic nematodes at any given time, particularly in tropical and subtropical regions.

Ecological Significance

Nematodes make up ~80% of animal life in soils and ~90% on the ocean floor
They regulate microbial populations
They recycle nutrients essential to plant growth
They form the base of many food webs

Evolutionary Implications

Nematodes thrive in conditions lethal to humans — extreme salinity, pressure, temperature, desiccation, and chemical toxicity. Their success reflects evolutionary adaptability, not environmental design for human comfort.

If Earth were “made for humans,” nematodes would be an odd afterthought. If it evolved naturally, they are exactly what we should expect.

The background to this research, conducted by a team led by Assistant Professor of Biology Michael Werner, is outlined in a University of Utah press release by Brian Maffly.

Great Salt Lake roundworm gets Shoshone name
New study by U biologists characterizes D. woaabi, first of two nematode species recently found in the lake's microbialites.
Nematodes recently discovered in the Great Salt Lake belong to at least one species that is new to science, and possibly two. A University of Utah research team has published a new paper characterizing the tiny roundworm and giving it a name that honors the Indigenous tribe whose ancestral lands include the lake.

Diplolaimelloides woaabi appears endemic to the Great Salt Lake, meaning it has not been found anywhere else, and likely plays a critical, but not yet understood, part of the lake’s ecosystem. To come up with the species name, the research team, led by assistant professor of biology Michael Werner, consulted the Northwestern Band of the Shoshone Nation, whose elders recommended Wo’aabi, an Indigenous word for “worm.”

Nematodes are ubiquitous on Earth, inhabiting nearly every environment, from polar ice to deep-sea thermal vents to the dirt in your backyard. Most are no longer than a millimeter, so these worms are rarely noticed by the untrained eye. With more than 250,000 known species, nematodes comprise the world’s most abundant animal phylum in both aquatic and terrestrial biospheres. About 80% of all animal life in the terrestrial soil and 90% on the ocean floor are nematodes.

Yet none had been positively detected in Great Salt Lake until 2022, when expeditions by kayak and bike led by Julie Jung, then a postdoctoral researcher in Werner’s lab, recovered nematodes in the lake’s microbiliates, the lithified mounds covering parts of the lakebed. Werner’s team reported that discovery in a paper last year.
We thought that this was probably a new species of nematode from the beginning, but it took three years of additional work to taxonomically confirm that suspicion.

Assistant Professor Julie Jung, lead author
School of Biological Sciences
University of Utah
Salt Lake City, Utah, USA.

A new creature in the Great Salt Lake

With the Werner lab’s discovery, nematodes became just the third metazoan taxon known to inhabit the lake’s highly saline waters, the other animals being brine shrimp and brine flies, which support vast populations of migratory birds during their seasonal stopovers. Ongoing work in the Werner lab also indicates that there might be a second, potentially new species among the specimens his team has brought into the lab, but it will take more research to be certain. The second author on the paper, Thomas Murray, is an undergraduate in the Werner lab who has been sampling different parts of the lake.

It’s hard to tell distinguishing characteristics, but genetically we can see that there are at least two populations out there.

Assistant Professor Michael S. Werner, senior author
Salt Lake City, Utah, USA.

The Great Salt Lake nematode discovery raises two new big questions. How did the worms get there? And what role do they play in the lake’s ecology?

From the onset, Werner’s team suspected the lake’s nematodes belonged to the family Monhysteridae, an ancient branch of the nematode phylum known for its adaptation to highly saline and other extreme environments. Through genetic and taxonomic analysis, the researchers concluded the new species under study belongs to the genus Diplolaimelloides, free-living nematodes found in coastal marine and brackish environments.

How did the worms get there?

The new species is now one of two members of this genus that don’t inhabit coastal environments, the other being found in eastern Mongolia. So how did it get to a lake 4,200 feet higher and 800 miles from the nearest sea?

That begs some more interesting, intriguing questions that you wouldn’t have even known to think of until we figured out the alpha taxonomy. There are two hypotheses, two models that are both kind of crazy for different reasons.

Assistant Professor Michael S. Werner.

The first was proposed by co-author Byron Adams, a Brigham Young University biology professor and renowned nematologist. Millions of years ago, during the Cretaceous Period, Utah sat on the west shore of a marine waterway bisecting what is now North America.

So we were on the beach here. This area was part of that seaway, and streams and rivers that drained into that beach would be great habitat for these kinds of organisms. With the Colorado Plateau lifting up, you formed a great basin, and these animals were trapped here. That’s something that we have to test out and do more science on, but that’s my go-to. The null hypothesis is that they’re here because they’ve always kind of been here.

Professor Byron J. Adams, co-author
Department of Biology
Brigham Young University
Salt Lake City, Utah, USA.

But Werner noted northern Utah has not always been home to a saline lake. Between 20,000 and 30,000 years ago, the region was covered by the vast freshwater Lake Bonneville.

If the nematode has been endemic since 100 million years ago, it has survived through these dramatic shifts in salinity at least once, probably a few times. [The other possibility] is that the nematodes arrived in the feathers of migratory birds that picked them up from saline lakes in South America. So who knows. Maybe the birds are transporting small invertebrates, including nematodes, across huge distances. Kind of hard to believe, but it seems like it has to be one of those two.

Assistant Professor Michael S. Werner.

A crucial bioindicator of the lake’s health

In the lab, the team made another mystifying observation. Female nematodes far outnumbered males among the samples.
That’s another confusing part of the story for us. When we sample out there on the lake and bring them back in the lab, we get less than 1% males. But when we have cultured them in the lab, the males make up about 50% of the sex ratio. We’re super happy to be able to culture them in the lab, but there’s something about it that’s clearly different than the lake environment.

Assistant Professor Michael S. Werner.

These creatures inhabit the algal mats covering the lakebed microbialites, dining on the abundant bacteria that live on them. The researchers discovered the worms are largely confined to the top few centimeters of the mats; below that, they were not detected. More research is needed to determine where exactly the nematodes fit in the lake’s food chain, but given their abundance and importance in other ecosystems, it’s almost certain they play an important role in the Great Salt Lake.

Nematodes are important bioindicators of environmental health. Their numbers, species diversity and where they’re found can reveal changes in water quality, salt levels or the chemistry of sediments. With the Great Salt Lake under heavy human pressure, this newly discovered species could become a useful “early warning system” for tracking ecosystem change, according to the study.

When you only have a handful of species that can persist in environments like that, and they’re really sensitive to change, those serve as really good sentinel taxa. They tell you how healthy is your ecosystem.

Professor Byron J. Adams.

The fact that it lives only on microbialites suggests it may have special relationships with microbes or unusual life strategies that deserve more study. Because microbialites are key to producing much of the lake’s energy and food, any interactions between these nematodes and other organisms could ripple through the entire Great Salt Lake ecosystem.

Coauthors include Solinus Farrer, Abigail Borgmeier and Byron J. Adams of Brigham Young University; Jon Wang and Morgan Marcus of the University of Utah; Gustavo Fonseca, Federal University of São Paulo; Thomas Powers, University of Nebraska.

Publication:
Jung, Julie, et al.
Diplolaimelloides woaabi sp. n. (Nematoda: Monhysteridae): A Novel Species of Free-Living Nematode from the Great Salt Lake, Utah. Journal of Nematology, vol. 57, no. 1, Society of Nematologists, Inc., 2025, https://doi.org/10.2478/jofnem-2025-0048

Abstract A new species of free-living nematode inhabiting microbialites in Great Salt Lake, Utah, USA is described both molecularly by 18S-sequencing and morphologically with scanning electron microscopy and differential interference contrast (DIC) microscopy. Diplolaimelloides woaabi sp. nov. (family Monhysteridae, order Monhysterida) is characterized by a combination of the following characters: ocelli present; a relatively small body size (<1.5 mm); short anterior sensory setae; cryptospiral amphidial fovea; a funnel-shaped anterior buccal cavity and reduced secondary cavity; fused lips; long double spicules and conspicuous male bursa displaying four pairs of post-cloacal papillae arranged in a (2 + 2) pattern, a single mid-ventral pre-cloacal papilla, two pairs of papillae posterior to the bursa, and an additional offset mid-tail papillae pair; and a pair of sub-apical extensions on spicules. An updated key to all species of Diplolaimelloides Meyl, 1954 is given. This species is notable for its adaptation to hypersaline microbialites, positioning it as both an extremophile and a potential bioindicator of ecological change in Great Salt Lake.

Jung, Julie, et al.
Diplolaimelloides woaabi sp. n. (Nematoda: Monhysteridae): A Novel Species of Free-Living Nematode from the Great Salt Lake, Utah. Journal of Nematology, vol. 57, no. 1, Society of Nematologists, Inc., 2025, https://doi.org/10.2478/jofnem-2025-0048

Copyright: © 2025 The authors.
Published by Society of Nematologists, Inc. Open access.
Reprinted under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license (CC BY 4.0)

Discoveries such as this are awkward facts for creationism, because they expose a reality very different from the imagined world of a benevolent designer crafting a planet specifically for human comfort. Earth is not, and never has been, a place optimised for our species. Instead, it is a planet shaped by deep time, geological violence, chemical extremes, and relentless natural selection — conditions under which humans survive only precariously, and often only with considerable technological assistance.

By contrast, nematodes flourish almost everywhere. They dominate soils, oceans, extreme environments, and even the internal organs of other animals, including ourselves. Their success is not the result of foresight or purpose, but of evolutionary flexibility: small size, simple body plans, rapid reproduction, and an extraordinary capacity to adapt to conditions that would kill most forms of life outright.

Far from supporting the notion of a world designed with humanity in mind, the ubiquity of nematodes reinforces the opposite conclusion. Life on Earth is shaped by what can survive, not by what is comfortable or convenient for humans. The planet does not resemble a carefully prepared habitat; it looks exactly like what evolutionary biology predicts — a dynamic, often hostile environment, populated overwhelmingly by organisms exquisitely adapted to conditions we would find utterly intolerable.

Once again, the natural world quietly but persistently contradicts the creationist narrative, not through ideology or rhetoric, but through simple, observable facts.

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