Spiroplasma

Moyaba, Percy, Ouedraogo, Gisele Ms, Pagabeleguem, Soumaïla, Njokou, Flobert, Freitas, Ngambia, Vreysen, Marc Jb & Abd-Alla, Adly Mm, 2023, Prevalence of Spiroplasma and interaction with wild Glossina tachinoides microbiota, Parasite (Paris, France) 30 (62), pp. 1-14 : 5

Prevalence of Spiroplasma

The presence of Spiroplasma in wild populations of tsetse flies was assessed using a PCR-based method to amplify part of the 16S rRNA gene. Positive samples were identified based on the observed amplicon band size in the electrophoresis gel for all tsetse species. Sequencing of the respective PCR amplicons revealed that Spiroplasma infection was only confirmed in G. tachinoides (N = 41) and G. f. fuscipes (N = 6), both belonging to the palpalis subgenus (Table 1). In the case of G. brevipalpis , G. m. morsitans , G. m. submorsitans, G. pallidipes , G. p. gambiensis, and G. p. palpalis , the amplified sequence belonged to different microbial species, primarily Bacillus cereus , Bacillus thuringiensis , Enterococcus cecorum , and some uncultured bacteria (Data not shown).

The PCR results indicated an overall Spiroplasma prevalence of 39.27% in G. tachinoides . The prevalence did not differ significantly between Burkina Faso, Ghana, and the laboratory colony (Χ 2 = 2.12, df = 2, and p = 0.34), with Burkina Faso and Ghana showing a prevalence rate of 46.56% and 52.94%, respectively ( Table 2). However, a significant variation in Spiroplasma prevalence was found across the various sampling locations (Χ 2 = 22.61, df = 8, and p = 0.003) ( Table 2 and Figs. 2 and 3 ). Specifically, there was a significant difference in prevalence between the two sampling locations in Burkina Faso (Χ 2 = 6.459, df = 1, and p = 0.01), with a higher prevalence observed in Folonzo. Similarly, a significant difference was found between the prevalence rate in different locations in Ghana (Χ 2 = 11.955, df = 5, and p = 0.03), with the highest prevalence observed in the Mortani region (98.44%), where 100% of the female flies were infected. Conversely, the lowest prevalence of Spiroplasma was recorded in Kumpole, Ghana (25%), with male flies showing no sign of infection ( Table 2, Figs. 2 and 3 ).

Figures

Figure 2. Prevalence of Spiroplasma according to location. Bars marked with the same lower-case letter do not differ significantly at the 0.05 level.

Figure 3. Prevalence of Spiroplasma and Trypanosoma (single and multiple) infections per country, location, and sex. Prevalence data were square root transformed and averaged based on location-sex and the matrix display was conducted in PRIMER version 7 + software. Tree on the left of the matrix is the similarity dendrogram based on the similarity index of the square root of the prevalence values. The color index is the square root of the prevalence values ranged 0–9 which is the square root of 0–81% prevalence.