Publication details

Effect of Climate and Land Use on the Spatio-Temporal Variability of Tick-Borne Bacteria in Europe

Authors	ROSA R. ANDREO V. TAGLIAPIETRA V. BARAKOVA I. ARNOLDI D. HAUFFE H.C. MANICA M. ROSSO F. BLANAROVA L. BONA M. DERDAKOVA M. HAMSIKOVA Zuzana KAZIMIROVA Maria KRALJIK J. KOCIANOVA E. MAHRIKOVA L. MINICHOVA L. MOSANSKY L. SLOVAK M. STANKO Michal ŠPITALSKA Eva DUCHEYNE E. NETELER M. HUBÁLEK Zdeněk RUDOLF Ivo VENCLIKOVA K. SILAGHI C. OVERZIER E. FARKAS Robert FOLDVARI G. HORNOK S. TAKACS N. RIZZOLI A.
Year of publication	2018
Type	Article in Periodical
Magazine / Source	International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health
MU Faculty or unit	Faculty of Science
Citation
Web	http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ijerph15040732
Doi	http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ijerph15040732
Keywords	land use; acarological hazard; Borrelia burgdorferi sensu lato; Anaplasma phagocytophilum; Rickettsia spp.; normalized difference vegetation index; density of infected nymphs
Description	The incidence of tick-borne diseases caused by Borrelia burgdorferi sensu lato, Anaplasma phagocytophilum and Rickettsia spp. has been rising in Europe in recent decades. Early pre-assessment of acarological hazard still represents a complex challenge. The aim of this study was to model Ixodes ricinus questing nymph density and its infection rate with B. burgdorferi s.l., A. phagocytophilum and Rickettsia spp. in five European countries (Italy, Germany, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Hungary) in various land cover types differing in use and anthropisation (agricultural, urban and natural) with climatic and environmental factors (Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI), Normalized Difference Water Index (NDWI), Land Surface Temperature (LST) and precipitation). We show that the relative abundance of questing nymphs was significantly associated with climatic conditions, such as higher values of NDVI recorded in the sampling period, while no differences were observed among land use categories. However, the density of infected nymphs (DIN) also depended on the pathogen considered and land use. These results contribute to a better understanding of the variation in acarological hazard for Ixodes ricinus transmitted pathogens in Central Europe and provide the basis for more focused ecological studies aimed at assessing the effect of land use in different sites on tick host pathogens interaction.