The Midgut Bacterial Flora of Laboratory-Reared Hard Ticks, Haemaphysalis longicornis, Hyalomma asiaticum, and Rhipicephalus haemaphysaloides
LI Chun-hong, CAO Jie, ZHOU Yong-zhi, ZHANG Hou-shuang, GONG Hai-yan , ZHOU Jin-lin (1National Key Facility for Crop Gene Resources and Genetic Improvement/Institute of Crop Sciences, Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Beijing 100081, P.R.China 2Crop Research Institute, Taizhou Academy of Agricultural Sciences of Zhejiang Province, Linhai 317000, P.R.China 3International Rice Research Institute, DAPO 777, Metro Malina, The Philippines)
Ixodid ticks play an important role in the transmission of a variety of zoonoses of viral, bacterial and protozoan origin, and they also harbor a wealth of microorganisms. To gain more detailed insights into the potential interactions between bacterial flora and tick-borne pathogens, we investigated the midgut bacterial flora of laboratory-reared Haemaphysalis longicornis, Hyalomma asiaticum and Rhipicephalus haemaphysaloides. Based on morphological, biochemical, and 16S rDNA sequencing results, we identified 15 species belonging to 12 genera in the midgut of the three ticks. The bacterial communities were similar to those found in other studies of hematophagous arthropods. Kocuria sp. was the most frequently isolated species and its 16S rDNA gene sequence was very similar to Kocuria koreensis P31T. To our knowledge, this is the first report of the bacterial flora of tick midguts and the results show that there were many different bacterial species in each tick species. Among the most common genera, there may have been a novel species in the genus Kocuria. The results might be the first step for looking for different aspects of the pathogen and tick interaction.
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