Current Microbiology

, Volume 73, Issue 5, pp 704–713 | Cite as

Infection Rates of Wolbachia sp. and Bartonella sp. in Different Populations of Fleas

  • Antonio Zurita
  • Sara García Gutiérrez
  • Cristina Cutillas
Article
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Abstract

In the present study, a molecular detection of Bartonella sp. and Wolbachia sp. in Ctenocephalides felis (Siphonaptera: Pulicidae) isolated from Canis lupus familiaris from different geographical areas of Spain, Iran and South Africa, and in Stenoponia tripectinata tripectinata isolated from Mus musculus from the Canary Islands has been carried out by amplification of the 16S ribosomal RNA partial gene of Wolbachia sp. and intergenic spacer region (its region) of Bartonella sp. A total of 70 % of C. felis analysed were infected by W. pipientis. This percentage of prevalence was considerably higher in female fleas than in male fleas. Bartonella DNA was not detected in C. felis from dogs, while Bartonella elizabethae was detected and identified in S. t. tripectinata from M. musculus from the Canary Islands representing 43.75 % prevalence. This report is the first to identify B. elizabethae in S. t. tripectinata collected in M. musculus from the Canary Islands. Thus, our results demonstrate that this flea is a potential vector of B. elizabethae and might play roles in human infection. The zoonotic character of this bartonellosis emphasizes the need to alert public health authorities and the veterinary community of the risk of infection.

Keywords

Canary Island Felis Intergenic Space Region Wolbachia Strain Flea Species 
These keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.
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Notes

Acknowledgments

The present work was supported by a Grant of the V Plan Propio de Investigación of the University of Sevilla, Spain. We wish to thank Dr. Ali Halajian for his assistance in the course of the field work, the Biodiversity Research Chair (University of Limpopo: Professor Wilmien J. Luus-Powell) for funding the field works in South Africa, Firouz-Farideh for partly funding field works in Iran, and Pietersburg Veterinary Clinic (Polokwane, South Africa) for helping with some of the samples. We thank Mrs. Anne Kendall for the critical reading of the manuscript.

Supplementary material

284_2016_1119_MOESM1_ESM.jpg (708 kb)
Supplementary material 1 (PNG 285 kb)Fig. S1 Percentage, by sex, of Ctenocephalides felis infected with Wolbachia pipientis

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Copyright information

© Springer Science+Business Media New York 2016

Authors and Affiliations

  • Antonio Zurita
    • 1
  • Sara García Gutiérrez
    • 1
  • Cristina Cutillas
    • 1
  1. 1.Department of Microbiology and Parasitology, Faculty of PharmacyUniversity of SevillaSevilleSpain

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