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Dissemination of Spotted Fever Rickettsia Agents in Europe by Migrating Birds

Migratory birds are known to play a role as long-distance vectors for many microorganisms. To investigate whether this is true of rickettsial agents as well, we characterized tick infestation and gathered ticks from 13,260 migratory passerine birds in Sweden. A total of 1127 Ixodes spp. ticks were r...

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Autores principales: Elfving, Karin, Olsen, Björn, Bergström, Sven, Waldenström, Jonas, Lundkvist, Åke, Sjöstedt, Anders, Mejlon, Hans, Nilsson, Kenneth
Formato: Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Public Library of Science 2010
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2797135/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20052286
http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0008572
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author Elfving, Karin
Olsen, Björn
Bergström, Sven
Waldenström, Jonas
Lundkvist, Åke
Sjöstedt, Anders
Mejlon, Hans
Nilsson, Kenneth
author_facet Elfving, Karin
Olsen, Björn
Bergström, Sven
Waldenström, Jonas
Lundkvist, Åke
Sjöstedt, Anders
Mejlon, Hans
Nilsson, Kenneth
author_sort Elfving, Karin
collection PubMed
description Migratory birds are known to play a role as long-distance vectors for many microorganisms. To investigate whether this is true of rickettsial agents as well, we characterized tick infestation and gathered ticks from 13,260 migratory passerine birds in Sweden. A total of 1127 Ixodes spp. ticks were removed from these birds and the extracted DNA from 957 of them was available for analyses. The DNA was assayed for detection of Rickettsia spp. using real-time PCR, followed by DNA sequencing for species identification. Rickettsia spp. organisms were detected in 108 (11.3%) of the ticks. Rickettsia helvetica, a spotted fever rickettsia associated with human infections, was predominant among the PCR-positive samples. In 9 (0.8%) of the ticks, the partial sequences of 17kDa and ompB genes showed the greatest similarity to Rickettsia monacensis, an etiologic agent of Mediterranean spotted fever-like illness, previously described in southern Europe as well as to the Rickettsia sp.IrITA3 strain. For 15 (1.4%) of the ticks, the 17kDa, ompB, gltA and ompA genes showed the greatest similarity to Rickettsia sp. strain Davousti, Rickettsia japonica and Rickettsia heilongjiangensis, all closely phylogenetically related, the former previously found in Amblyomma tholloni ticks in Africa and previously not detected in Ixodes spp. ticks. The infestation prevalence of ticks infected with rickettsial organisms was four times higher among ground foraging birds than among other bird species, but the two groups were equally competent in transmitting Rickettsia species. The birds did not seem to serve as reservoir hosts for Rickettsia spp., but in one case it seems likely that the bird was rickettsiemic and that the ticks had acquired the bacteria from the blood of the bird. In conclusion, migratory passerine birds host epidemiologically important vector ticks and Rickettsia species and contribute to the geographic distribution of spotted fever rickettsial agents and their diseases.
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spelling pubmed-27971352010-01-06 Dissemination of Spotted Fever Rickettsia Agents in Europe by Migrating Birds Elfving, Karin Olsen, Björn Bergström, Sven Waldenström, Jonas Lundkvist, Åke Sjöstedt, Anders Mejlon, Hans Nilsson, Kenneth PLoS One Research Article Migratory birds are known to play a role as long-distance vectors for many microorganisms. To investigate whether this is true of rickettsial agents as well, we characterized tick infestation and gathered ticks from 13,260 migratory passerine birds in Sweden. A total of 1127 Ixodes spp. ticks were removed from these birds and the extracted DNA from 957 of them was available for analyses. The DNA was assayed for detection of Rickettsia spp. using real-time PCR, followed by DNA sequencing for species identification. Rickettsia spp. organisms were detected in 108 (11.3%) of the ticks. Rickettsia helvetica, a spotted fever rickettsia associated with human infections, was predominant among the PCR-positive samples. In 9 (0.8%) of the ticks, the partial sequences of 17kDa and ompB genes showed the greatest similarity to Rickettsia monacensis, an etiologic agent of Mediterranean spotted fever-like illness, previously described in southern Europe as well as to the Rickettsia sp.IrITA3 strain. For 15 (1.4%) of the ticks, the 17kDa, ompB, gltA and ompA genes showed the greatest similarity to Rickettsia sp. strain Davousti, Rickettsia japonica and Rickettsia heilongjiangensis, all closely phylogenetically related, the former previously found in Amblyomma tholloni ticks in Africa and previously not detected in Ixodes spp. ticks. The infestation prevalence of ticks infected with rickettsial organisms was four times higher among ground foraging birds than among other bird species, but the two groups were equally competent in transmitting Rickettsia species. The birds did not seem to serve as reservoir hosts for Rickettsia spp., but in one case it seems likely that the bird was rickettsiemic and that the ticks had acquired the bacteria from the blood of the bird. In conclusion, migratory passerine birds host epidemiologically important vector ticks and Rickettsia species and contribute to the geographic distribution of spotted fever rickettsial agents and their diseases. Public Library of Science 2010-01-05 /pmc/articles/PMC2797135/ /pubmed/20052286 http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0008572 Text en Elfving et al. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are properly credited.
spellingShingle Research Article
Elfving, Karin
Olsen, Björn
Bergström, Sven
Waldenström, Jonas
Lundkvist, Åke
Sjöstedt, Anders
Mejlon, Hans
Nilsson, Kenneth
Dissemination of Spotted Fever Rickettsia Agents in Europe by Migrating Birds
title Dissemination of Spotted Fever Rickettsia Agents in Europe by Migrating Birds
title_full Dissemination of Spotted Fever Rickettsia Agents in Europe by Migrating Birds
title_fullStr Dissemination of Spotted Fever Rickettsia Agents in Europe by Migrating Birds
title_full_unstemmed Dissemination of Spotted Fever Rickettsia Agents in Europe by Migrating Birds
title_short Dissemination of Spotted Fever Rickettsia Agents in Europe by Migrating Birds
title_sort dissemination of spotted fever rickettsia agents in europe by migrating birds
topic Research Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2797135/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20052286
http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0008572
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