Abstract
Piroplasmosis is a disease that negatively affects equine health worldwide. Hence, 324 blood samples were collected from grazing horses in ten sites in Xinjiang and testing them for the presence of Theileria equi and Babesia caballi by PCR of the EMA-1 gene and BC48 gene, respectively. Of the 324 blood samples, 161 (49.7%) were positive for equine piroplasms. The prevalence of T. equi was 38.9% (126/324), while that of B. caballi was 30.2% (98/324). The T. equi and B. caballi co-infection rate was 19.4% (63/324). From the 126 EMA-1 gene sequences and 98 BC48 gene sequences we obtained, 21 and 27 genotypes were identified, respectively. The EMA-1 sequences together with the GenBank reference sequences grouped into four clusters, with those from the present study forming two distinct clusters. In contrast, the BC48 sequences formed eight clusters with the GenBank reference sequences, while those obtained in the present study formed five distinct clusters. Our results highlight the widespread distribution and abundant gene polymorphism of T. equi and B. caballi in grazing horses from Xinjiang.
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Data availability
All of the data generated and analyzed during this study are included in this published manuscript. The nucleotide sequences obtained in this study have been deposited in GenBank under accession numbers: MK580502-MK580528 and MK568953-MK568972.
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Funding
This work was supported by the Program for Young and Middle-aged Leading Science, Technology, and Innovation of Xinjiang Production & Construction Corps (2018CB034).
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MQ and CSN contributed to the conception and design of the experiments. JW, FCY, and DYT performed sample collection. DYT and AYZ were involved in data collection and analysis. YYC and GM helped drafting and reviewing the manuscript. All of the authors read and approved the final manuscript.
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The research protocol was reviewed and approved by the Research Ethics Committee of Tarim University (Approval No. IRC-TARU-20180403–02). Appropriate permission was obtained from the farm owners before collecting blood samples from their horses.
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Wu, J., Cui, Y., Yu, F. et al. Prevalence and genetic characterization of Theileria equi and Babesia caballi in grazing horses in Xinjiang, northwestern China. Parasitol Res 122, 387–394 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00436-022-07749-4
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00436-022-07749-4