Rickettsial Infection in Ticks from a National Park in the Cerrado Biome, Midwestern Brazil

Raquel Loren Dos Reis Paludo; Warley Vieira de Freitas Paula; Lucianne Cardoso Neves; Luiza Gabriella Ferreira de Paula; Nicolas Jalowitzki de Lima; Bianca Barbara Fonseca da Silva; Brenda Gomes Pereira; Gracielle Teles Pádua; Filipe Dantas-Torres; Marcelo B Labruna; Thiago Fernandes Martins; Jonas Sponchiado; Lucas Christian de Sousa-Paula; Wellington Hannibal; Felipe da Silva Krawczak

doi:10.3390/pathogens13010013

Rickettsial Infection in Ticks from a National Park in the Cerrado Biome, Midwestern Brazil

Pathogens. 2023 Dec 22;13(1):13. doi: 10.3390/pathogens13010013.

Authors

Raquel Loren Dos Reis Paludo^{1

2}, Warley Vieira de Freitas Paula¹, Lucianne Cardoso Neves¹, Luiza Gabriella Ferreira de Paula¹, Nicolas Jalowitzki de Lima¹, Bianca Barbara Fonseca da Silva¹, Brenda Gomes Pereira¹, Gracielle Teles Pádua¹, Filipe Dantas-Torres³, Marcelo B Labruna⁴, Thiago Fernandes Martins^{4

5}, Jonas Sponchiado⁶, Lucas Christian de Sousa-Paula⁷, Wellington Hannibal⁸, Felipe da Silva Krawczak¹

Affiliations

¹ Setor de Medicina Veterinária Preventiva, Departamento de Medicina Veterinária, Escola de Veterinária e Zootecnia, Universidade Federal de Goiás-UFG, Goiânia 74690-900, Brazil.
² Centro Universitário de Mineiros-UNIFIMES, Mineiros 75833-130, Brazil.
³ Departamento de Imunologia, Instituto Ageu Magalhães-IAM, Fundação Oswaldo Cruz (Fiocruz), Recife 50740-465, Brazil.
⁴ Departamento de Medicina Veterinária Preventiva e Saúde Animal, Faculdade de Medicina Veterinária e Zootecnia, Universidade de São Paulo-USP, São Paulo 05508-270, Brazil.
⁵ Instituto Pasteur, Área Técnica de Doenças Vinculadas a Vetores e Hospedeiros Intermediários, Secretaria de Estado da Saúde de São Paulo, São Paulo 01027-000, Brazil.
⁶ Instituto Federal de Educação, Ciência e Tecnologia Farroupilha, Campus Alegrete, Alegrete 97541-000, Brazil.
⁷ Tick-Pathogen Transmission Unit, Laboratory of Bacteriology, National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, Hamilton, MT 59840, USA.
⁸ Laboratório de Ecologia e Biogeografia de Mamíferos, Universidade Estadual de Goiás-UEG, Quirinópolis 75860-000, Brazil.

Abstract

This study was carried out from February 2020 to September 2021 in Parque Nacional das Emas (PNE), a national park located in the Cerrado biome, midwestern Brazil, as well as in surrounding rural properties. Serum and tick samples were collected from dogs, terrestrial small mammals, and humans. Ticks were also collected from the environment. Dogs were infested with Rhipicephalus linnaei adults, whereas small mammals were infested by immature stages of Amblyomma spp., Amblyomma triste, Amblyomma dubitatum, and Amblyomma coelebs. Ticks collected from vegetation belonged to several species of the genus Amblyomma, including A. coelebs, A. dubitatum, Amblyomma naponense, Amblyomma sculptum, and A. triste. Two Rickettsia species were molecularly detected in ticks: Rickettsia parkeri in A. triste from the vegetation and a Rickettsia sp. (designated Rickettsia sp. strain PNE) in A. sculptum and A. triste collected from lowland tapirs (Tapirus terrestris). Based on short gltA gene fragments, this rickettsial organism showed 99.7-100% to Rickettsia tillamookensis. Seroreactivity to Rickettsia antigens was detected in 21.9% of dogs, 15.4% of small mammals, and 23.5% of humans. The present study reveals the richness of ticks and demonstrates the circulation of rickettsial agents in one of the largest conservation units in the Cerrado biome in Brazil. To our knowledge, this is the first report of a rickettsial phylogenetically related to R. tillamookensis in Brazil.

Keywords: Amblyomma sculptum; Amblyomma triste; Rickettsia parkeri; Rickettsia tillamookensis.

Grants and funding

This research was funded by the Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior—Brazil (CAPES)—Finance Code 001, CNPq (Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico) and Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de Goiás (FAPEG; process number: 202110267000287). LCSP is supported by the Intramural Research Program of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. This work utilized the computational resources of the NIH HPC Biowulf cluster (http://hpc.nih.gov (accessed on 10 October 2023)). F.S.K. received a productivity scholarship from CNPq (process number: 317557/2021-1). TFM was supported by Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo (FAPESP) (process numbers: 2019/03167-0; 2020/05987-1).