AUTHOR=Regier Yvonne , Komma Kassandra , Weigel Markus , Pulliainen Arto T. , Göttig Stephan , Hain Torsten , Kempf Volkhard A. J. 

TITLE=Microbiome Analysis Reveals the Presence of Bartonella spp. and Acinetobacter spp. in Deer Keds (Lipoptena cervi)

JOURNAL=Frontiers in Microbiology

VOLUME=9

YEAR=2018

URL=https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/microbiology/articles/10.3389/fmicb.2018.03100

DOI=10.3389/fmicb.2018.03100

ISSN=1664-302X

ABSTRACT=<p>The deer ked (<italic>Lipoptena cervi</italic>) is distributed in Europe, North America, and Siberia and mainly infests cervids as roe deer, fallow deer, and moose. From a one health perspective, deer keds occasionally bite other animals or humans and are a potential vector for <italic>Bartonella schoenbuchensis</italic>. This bacterium belongs to a lineage of ruminant-associated <italic>Bartonella</italic> spp. and is suspected to cause dermatitis and febrile diseases in humans. In this study, we analyzed the microbiome from 130 deer keds collected from roe deer, fallow deer and humans in the federal states of Hesse, Baden-Wuerttemberg, and Brandenburg, Germany. Endosymbiontic <italic>Arsenophonus</italic> spp. and <italic>Bartonella</italic> spp. represented the biggest portion (~90%) of the microbiome. Most <italic>Bartonella</italic> spp. (<italic>n</italic> = 93) were confirmed to represent <italic>B. schoenbuchensis</italic>. In deer keds collected from humans, no <italic>Bartonella</italic> spp. were detected. Furthermore, <italic>Acinetobacter</italic> spp. were present in four samples, one of those was confirmed to represent <italic>A. baumannii</italic>. These data suggest that deer keds harbor only a very narrow spectrum of bacteria which are potentially pathogenic for animals of humans.</p>