article_snippet: Researchers looked at cannibalism among freshwater shrimp in Northern Ireland.
article_snippet: Researchers found a tiny parasite, Pleistophora mulleri, not only significantly increased cannibalism among shrimp, but made infected shrimp more voracious, taking much less time to consume Researchers victims.
article_snippet: A tiny parasite, Pleistophora mulleri,  significantly increased cannibalism among shrimp - and caused them to eat in a frenzy .
article_snippet: However, cannibalism for the shrimp, unlike in humans, is a significant source of food even in uninfected animals. '
article_snippet: Queen's University Belfast and Stellenbosch University in South Africa found a tiny parasite, Pleistophora mulleri, not only significantly increased cannibalism among the indigenous shrimp Gammarus duebeni celticus but made infected shrimp more voracious, taking much less time to consume infected shrimp victims.
article_snippet: The research, published in Royal Society Open Science today, reports that although consumption of juveniles by adults is a normal feature of the shrimp's feeding patterns, shrimp infected with the parasite ate twice as much of the parasite own kind as uninfected animals.
article_snippet: the parasite attacked juvenile shrimp more often and consumed the parasite more quickly than did uninfected shrimp.
article_snippet: The parasite takes over huge areas of the muscle, so instead of a nice transparent shrimp you get quite a chalky appearance because of muscles packed with The parasite. '
article_snippet: Interestingly, our group has also found previously that infected shrimp may be able to catch and eat less prey of other animal species. '
article_snippet: Perhaps cannibalism of smaller shrimp is the only way these sick animals can survive.'
article_snippet: their study in in Royal Society Open Science also found that uninfected adult shrimp were less likely to cannibalize infected juvenile shrimp than uninfected juveniles.
article_snippet: Dr Dunn Dr Dunn said: 'The parasite is passed to The parasite either when The parasite dies and is eaten by another shrimp, or when one shrimp cannibalises another. '
article_snippet: But we observed that uninfected shrimp avoid parasitised food and that is good for another shrimp as another shrimp means that another shrimp can obtain food through cannibalism but still avoid parasitic infection. '
article_snippet: Infected shrimp don't avoid infected juveniles. '
article_snippet: However, cannibalism for the shrimp, unlike in humans, is a significant source of food even in uninfected animals. '
highlights_snippet: Tiny parasite, Pleistophora mulleri, significantly increased cannibalism .
  
highlights_snippet: made infected shrimp more voracious, taking much less time to consume infected shrimp more voracious victims .