Nematodes

The Nematodes, also known as roundworms, Pristionchus pacificus (P. pacificus) and Caenorhabditis elegans (C. elegans), belong to the family of nematodes and lives mainly in the soil. It feeds on soil bacteria and is only about one millimeter in size.

In the lab, the researchers grow it on an agar plate seeded with E. coli bacteria at a constant temperature of 20°C. The worms are hermaphrodites, which means they can fertilize themselves. They lay up to 300 eggs during their lifetime, which lasts only two to three weeks. The larvae develop from the fertilized egg within half a day and after another 40 hours the animals are fully grown. Since eggs and larvae are transparent, each individual cell and its divisions can be observed live under the microscope. The animals are true survival experts and can be stored for decades at -80°C and revived after thawing.

P. pacificus and C. elegans are an ideal model organism for research into the genetics of developmental processes due to its tiny size and rapid generation time.