Multi-locus phylogenetic analysis groups the New World bacterium Rickettsia sp. strain ApPR with the Old World species R. africae; proposal of “Candidatus Rickettsia paranaensis”
Publication date: Available online 12 July 2019Source: Ticks and Tick-borne DiseasesAuthor(s): Maristela Peckle, Hermes R. Luz, Marcelo B. Labruna, Maria Carolina A. Serpa, Stanley Lima, Ralph Maturano, João L.H. Faccini, Douglas McIntoshAbstractRickettsia parkeri sensu stricto (s.s.) is an emerging human pathogen in the Americas. Comprehension of the etiology of R. parkeri infections in South America is complicated by the existence of genetic variants (Atlantic rainforest, NOD and Parvitarsum) of this species that are associated with specific groups of Amblyomma ticks. The rickettsial bacterium strain ApPR was first reported in Amblyomma parkeri ticks in Southern Brazil in 2012 and was considered, based on sequencing of fragments of the gltA, htrA, ompA and ompB genes, to represent yet another genetic variant of R. parkeri. In the current work, a multi-locus phylogenetic analysis employing additional genes and intragenic regions was performed using DNA extracted from (a) larvae of A. parkeri and Amblyomma species haplotype Nazaré ticks collected from wild birds, (b) a nymph of Amblyomma sp. haplotype Nazaré recovered from a monkey (Callicebus nigrifons), representing the first report of that tick parasitizing a non-human primate and (c) from a cultured isolate of ApPR, isolated from colony-reared adults of Amblyomma geayi. Phylogenetic inference performed using Maximum-likelihood (ML), Maximum Parsimony (MP) and Bayesian (B) methods, consistently placed strain ApPR outsid...
Source: Ticks and Tick borne Diseases - Category: Zoology Source Type: research