Trait-based research holds high potential to unveil ecological and evolutionary processes. Functional traits are fitness-related characteristics of individuals, which are measured at individual level and defined without using information external to the individual. Despite the usefulness of the functional approach to understand the performance of individuals in ecosystems, and parasitism being the most common life-history strategy on Earth, studies based on functional traits of parasites are still scarce. Since the choice of functional traits is a critical step for any study, we propose a core list of seven functional traits of metazoan parasites, related to three universal challenges faced by organisms (dispersal, establishment, and persistence), and give guidelines to define appropriate functional traits in future parasite community studies.

中文翻译：

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建立针对寄生虫的统一功能特性框架。

基于特征的研究具有揭示生态和进化过程的巨大潜力。功能性状是与个人健康相关的特征，这些特征是在个人水平上测量的，无需使用个人外部信息即可定义。尽管功能性方法有助于理解个体在生态系统中的性能，并且寄生是地球上最常见的生命历史策略，但基于寄生虫功能性状的研究仍然很少。由于功能性状的选择对于任何研究都是至关重要的步骤，因此我们提出了后生寄生虫的七个功能性状的核心清单，涉及生物体所面临的三个普遍挑战（分散，建立和持久性），并提供了定义适当准则的指导原则。未来的寄生虫群落研究中的功能特征。