MOLECULAR DIAGNOSIS AND PHYLOGENETIC ANALYSIS OF BABESIA SPECIES ISOLATED FROM TICKS OF INFESTED CATTLE IN WASIT GOVERNORATE, IRAQ

Al-Abedi Al-Amery

doi:10.36103/ijas.v52i1.1245

Abstract

The aim of current study is to detect Babesia bovis, B. bigemina, and B. divergens in ticks using molecular polymerase chain reaction (PCR) assay. In a totally 180 cattle examined to collect of tick samples during December 2018 to August 2019, the findings were revealed on 63 (35%) cattle infested with ticks that classified morphologically to belong to the genus of Hyalomma and genus of Rhipicephalus. From 50 tick samples tested by PCR assay, 41 (82%) were infested by Babesia genus including 30 (68.18%) infested with B. bovis and 11 (31.82%) infested with B. bigemina; whereas, no tick samples were found to be infested with B. divergens. To document the local isolated strains, five PCR products of each B. bovis and B. bigemina positive strains were selected, sequenced and reported in the NCBI under the accession numbers of (MN727083.1, MN727084.1, MN727085.1, MN727086.1, and MN727087.1) and (MN741113.1, MN741114.1, MN741115.1,MN741116.1, and MN741117.1) respectively.

Highlights

The genus of Babesia is one of the more pathogenic tick-borne parasites which infect many domestic and wildlife animals as well as humans resulting in an intraerythrocytic infection, babesiosis [30]
Babesiosis can detect acutely based on the clinical symptoms and confirmed by microscopic examination of blood smears and or molecular assays whereas in chronic infection, serological techniques as enzyme-linked immunosorbent assays in addition to molecular techniques as polymerase chain reaction which demonstrates with a great value [15]
For DNA amplification, four sets of primers that designed based on internal transcribed spacer 1 (ITS1) region of 18S rRNA gene of the National Centers for Biotechnology Information (GenBank-NCBI) and provided by the Company of Macrogen (South Korea) were used in this study to detect of Babesia spp., B. bovis, B. bigemina and B. divergens (Table 1)

Summary

Introduction

The genus of Babesia is one of the more pathogenic tick-borne parasites which infect many domestic and wildlife animals as well as humans resulting in an intraerythrocytic infection, babesiosis [30]. Babesia species undergo a complex unique life cycle to perpetuate their parasitic existence by propagation and to guarantee host-to-host transmission through specialized infective stages [38]. This mediated by the combination of two asexual reproduction cycles and one sexual reproduction cycle, which alternate between the vertebrate host and the tick vector [25, 36]. Xenodiagnosis that is, detection of Babesia spp. from ticks, either by microscopy, culture in artificial media and animal inoculation, or molecular techniques has been employed for supportive epidemiological evidence in the diagnosis of babesiosis [8]. The present study carried out for molecular characterization of ITS1 region of 18S rRNA of B. bovis, B. bigemina, and B. divergens alongside its phylogenetic relationship with the other local and global isolates/strains

Methods

Results

Conclusion