A Kansas University professor will be discussing a rather unsettling topic this week — the more than 5,000 species of tapeworms living in the intestines of their vertebrate hosts.

Kirsten Jensen, assistant professor of ecology and evolutionary biology, will lead the discussion at 7 p.m. Wednesday at KU’s Natural History Museum.

Her talk, “From the Vertebrate Bowels of the Earth,” is the first in this academic year’s “Wild Science” series at the Natural History Museum.

The event is free and open to the public, and allows the public a chance to ask questions directly to researchers in an informal setting.

Coffee, hot chocolate and cookies will be served.