Endosymbiotic bacteria in ticks in Kırşehir, Central Anatolia

Abstract

Ticks are parasites and vectors, whose diet is blood and hosts are vertebrates. Therefore, they are a risk factor for both, public health and farm animals. Ticks have a cosmopolitan distribution, and their prevalence and incidence of diseases caused by them are increasing with the effect of various environmental factors such as global warming. The use of endosymbiotic bacteria (EB) to control pests is a promising environment-friendly approach as an alternative to chemical methods. Therefore, it is necessary to elucidate the ticks symbionts to develop potentially alternative strategies for managing their populations. Aim of this study, was to search for EB in ticks obtained from livestock in Kırşehir, Central Anatolia. EB were identified by morphological and molecular methods. Investigation was conducted on most studied EB in Haemaphysalis spp. and Hyalomma spp. using Arsenophonus, Cardinium, Hamiltonella, Rickettsia, Spiroplasma and Wolbachia specific primers. As a result of the survey, Rickettsia was detected in all locations and samples, while Spiroplasma was detected only one sampling locality. It was that Rickettsia is not species specific and has a wide wide distribution incidence. Spiroplasma was found only in Ha. sulcata. In contrary Arsenophonus, Cardinium, Hamiltonella and Wolbachia were not found in the sampled ticks. On the other hand, although the reason could not be explained, PCR products thought to be the result of non-specific binding with Arsenophonus primers and sequence data similar to Coxiella-like endosymbiont were obtained. This study does not explain the tick-symbiosis relationship, but the findings are considered important for future studies of tick biology and/or tick-borne diseases.