Horsehair worms are one of the most poorly studied animal groups in the animal kingdom and their relationships and diversity are currently unknown. Freshwater hairworms, commonly called Gordian worms, can be up to 3 meters long and seem to appear suddenly in domestic sources of water (swimming pools, toilets, pet bowls, etc.), thus making human interactions with them quite common. These encounters have led to numerous unnecessary panic and trips to doctors and veterinarians. Hairworms, are parasites of insects, but are free-living in aquatic environments as adults. Insects become infected with hairworms when they ingest cyst stages which infect most aquatic invertebrates. Previous studies on the relationship of this group of parasites have been hindered by the lack of reliable ways to collect and differentiate horsehair worms. Matthew Bolek an assistant professor in zoology at Oklahoma State University along with Principal Investigator Ben Hanelt a research assistant professor of biology at the University of New Mexico and Andres Schmidt-Rhaesa a curator at the Zoological Museum at the University of Hamburg in Germany have received a grant from the National Science Foundation to examine the diversity and relationships of horsehair worms by collecting the most common life stage of horsehair worms in the environment, the cyst, and use modern DNA fingerprinting techniques to match these cysts to the adult worms. The study is the first of its kind and will give us an insight into how many species of horsehair worms are really out there and provide data on their relationships.