Ticks are obligate hematophagous parasite of vertebrate that transmit a range of pathogenic microorganisms that can cause diseases in livestock and humans. The range of tick-borne disease causative agents infecting domestic animals and humans has recently increased. Several significant zoonotic tick-borne diseases such as ehrlichiosis among others are on the increase worldwide. This study was designed to investigate the occurrence of zoonotic Ehrlichia spp. from samples collected from livestock in selected communities in the Eastern Cape Province, South Africa. Tick samples were manually collected from domesticated animals in selected homesteads. The ticks were morphologically identified to species and tested for Ehrlichia infection via polymerase chain reaction (PCR), using genus-specific disulphide bond formation protein (dsbA) gene primers. This was followed by sequence analysis of amplicons and phylogeny. Of the 1,200 ticks collected, Amblyomma hebraeum was most prevalent (n = 335; 27.9%), followed by Rhipicephalus appendiculatus (n = 274; 22.8%), Rhipicephalus decoloratus; (n = 224; 18.7%) and Rhipicephalus eversti eversti (n = 200, 16.7%). Ehrlichia DNA was detected in 19/1,200 (1.6%) of the screened DNA samples. A homology search of the generated sequences revealed a high percentage of identity between 95% and 98% with other homologous dsbA gene sequences of other Ehrlichia species in GenBank. Phylogenetic analysis showed that the obtained sequences clustered unambiguously with other Ehrlichia sequences from different geographical regions of the world. We concluded that Ehrlichial pathogens are vectored by the ticks collected from domesticated animals in the study areas, thus suggesting concern for public health, as some of the recovered pathogens are zoonotic in nature and could pose serious public health risk through human exposure to tick bites.

中文翻译：

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人畜共患埃里希氏菌的系统发育分析。来自南非东开普省的ixodid壁虱。

cks虫是脊椎动物的专性嗜血性寄生虫，可传播一系列可导致家畜和人类疾病的病原微生物。感染家畜和人类的of传播疾病病原体的范围最近有所增加。在世界范围内，几种严重的人畜共患的tick传播疾病（例如埃希氏菌病）正在增加。本研究旨在调查人畜共患的埃里希氏菌的发生。从南非东开普省选定社区的牲畜样本中采集。从选定的家园中手动采集家养动物的manually虫样本。使用属特异性二硫键形成蛋白（dsbA）基因引物，对to进行物种形态鉴定，并通过聚合酶链反应（PCR）测试E虫感染。然后进行扩增子的序列分析和系统发育。在收集的1200个s中，最常见的是Hembeombra hebraeum（n = 335； 27.9％），其次为阑尾Rhipicephalus（n = 274； 22.8％），Rhipicephalus decoloratus。（n = 224; 18.7％）和Rhipicephalus eversti eversti（n = 200，16.7％）。在筛查的DNA样本中有19 / 1,200（1.6％）检出了埃希氏菌DNA。对产生的序列的同源性搜索显示与GenBank中其他埃希氏菌属物种的其他同源dsbA基因序列具有高百分比的同一性，介于95％和98％之间。系统发育分析表明，所获得的序列与来自世界不同地理区域的其他埃希氏菌序列明确地聚集在一起。我们得出的结论是，埃希氏病菌病原体是由研究区域的家养动物采集的the虫传染的，