Babesiosis is an emerging zoonotic disease and various wildlife species are reservoir hosts for zoonotic species of Babesia Starcovici, 1893. The objective of the present study was to investigate the presence and prevalence of Babesia spp. in moose Alces alces (Linnaeus) in two regions of Norway. A total of 99 spleen samples were collected from animals of various ages from an area with the occurrence of the tick Ixodes ricinus (Linnaeus, 1758), and from an area where the ticks are known to be absent. Infection was detected by the amplification of different regions of the 18S rRNA gene by using two different PCR primer sets specific of Babesia. Babesia spp. were found in the spleen samples of four moose. All Babesia-infected animals were from an area where ticks occur, with an infection rate of 6% (4 of 70). Babesia-positive samples were obtained from a five-month old moose calf and three adults. Two Babesia species, Babesia capreoli (Enigk et Friedhoff, 1962) and a B. odocoilei-like, were identified. Co-infection with Anaplasma phagocytophilum was obtained in two animals. This is the first report of the occurrence of B. capreoli and B. odocoilei-like species in moose., Irma Pūraitė, Olav Rosef, Jana Radzijevskaja, Indrė Lipatova, Algimantas Paulauskas., and Obsahuje bibliografii
A new microsporidian species of the genus Glugea Thélohan, 1891 parasitising the marine teleost fish Cephalopholis hemistiktos Rüppell, collected from the Red Sea in Saudi Arabia, is described on the basis of microscopic and molecular procedures. Spherical and whitish xenoma were observed adhering to the intestinal wall. The numerous spores contained within these xenoma, were ovoid to pyriform and measured 4.3-6.0 µm (5.1 µm) in length and 1.8-2.9 µm (2.2 µm) in width. The spore's wall was composed of two thick layers, which were thinner in the area contacting the anchoring disk. The latter appeared at the spore's anterior pole, in an eccentric position to the longitudinal axis. A lamellar polaroplast surrounded the uncoiled portion of the polar filament projected to the basal region of the spore, giving rise to 26-29 turns with winding from the base to the anterior zone of the spore. The posterior vacuole, located at the spore's posterior pole, and surrounded by the polar filament coils, was irregular and composed of light material. Molecular analysis of the rRNA genes, including the ITS region, was performed using maximum parsimony, neighbour-joining and maximum likelihood methods. The ultrastructural features observed, combined with the phylogenetic data analysed, suggest this parasite to be a new species of the genus Glugea. This is the first species of this genus to be reported from Saudi Arabia and is herein named Glugea nagelia sp. n., Abdel-Azeem S. Abdel-Baki, Saleh Al-Quraishy, Sónia Rocha, Mohamed A. Dkhil, Graça Casal, Carlos Azevedo., and Obsahuje bibliografii