Occurrence and transmission efficiencies of Borrelia burgdorferi ospC types in avian and mammalian wildlife.

ABSTRACT: Borrelia burgdorferi s.s., the bacterium that causes Lyme disease in North America, circulates among a suite of vertebrate hosts and their tick vector. The bacterium can be differentiated at the outer surface protein C (ospC) locus into 25 genotypes. Wildlife hosts can be infected with a suite of ospC types but knowledge on the transmission efficiencies of these naturally infected hosts to ticks is still lacking. To evaluate the occupancy and detection of ospC types in wildlife hosts, we adapted a likelihood-based species patch occupancy model to test for the occurrence probabilities (ψ - "occupancy") and transmission efficiencies (ε - "detection") of each ospC type. We detected differences in ospC occurrence and transmission efficiencies from the null models with HIS (human invasive strai

SUBMITTER: Vuong HB 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4180015 | biostudies-literature | 2014 Oct

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature