Relapsing fever Borrelia spp. challenge microbiologic typing because they possess segmented genomes that maintain essential genes on large linear plasmids. Antigenic variation further complicates typing. Intergenic spacer (IGS, between 16S-23S genes) heterogeneity provides resolution among Lyme disease-associated and some relapsing fever spirochetes. We used an IGS fragment for typing East Afri...

Ticks are distributed worldwide and have an enormous medical and veterinary importance owing to the direct damage they cause to their hosts, and especially because these are vectors of a large variety of human and animal pathogens. In fact, ticks are second to mosquitoes as vectors of human pathogens and the most important vectors of pathogens affecting cattle worldwide [1-3]. Tick species can ...

Argas vespertilionis, an argasid tick associated with bats and bat habitats in Europe, Africa, and Asia has been reported to bite humans; however, studies investigating the presence of vector-borne pathogens in these ticks are lacking. Using molecular tools, we tested 5 A. vespertilionis ticks collected in 2010 from the floor of a bat-infested attic in southwestern France that had been converte...

Tickborne relapsing fever (TBRF) is a bacterial infection characterized by recurring episodes of fever, headache, muscle and joint aches, and nausea. In North America, TBRF primarily is caused by Borrelia hermsii spirochetes transmitted by Ornithodoros hermsii ticks. Once infected, these soft ticks are infectious for life and transmit the spirochete to sleeping humans quickly (possibly within 3...

Relapsing fever borreliae require lipid compounds for growth in vitro. In this study, the major pathways of lipid catabolism in three species of tick-borne relapsing fever borreliae were investigated. Thin-layer chromatography was used to compare chloroform-methanol extracts of fresh culture media with extracts of exhausted culture media after organisms were removed by centrifugation. The chrom...

flaviviridae are viruses that cause several diseases including dengue fever, japanese encephalitis, murray valley encephalitis, tick-borne encephalitis, west nile encephalitis, yellow fever and hepatitis c virus infection. members of this family have monopartite, linear, single-stranded rna genomes of positive polarity, 9.6-12.3 kb in length. here, we have analyzed the codon usage of 13 species...