Ticks have the ability to detect a cytokine from infected mammalian blood, triggering a defense mechanism against bacteria that cause Lyme disease. A team of researchers from the University of Maryland has uncovered the first inter-species signaling pathway between a host and an arthropod parasit
Bottom view of a larval blacklegged tick. The tick was microinjected with various fluorescent dyes to enhance its visual appearance. Credit: Utpal Pal / University of Maryland
“This adaptive flexibility of a conserved cell signaling pathway was surprising,” said Utpal Pal, senior author of the study and a professor in the Virginia-Maryland College of Veterinary Medicine at College Park. “It is remarkable that this pathway that is present in everything from sponges to humans is so flexible it can adapt to accept a ligand [a binding molecule] from another distant species. This tool that everybody has is being used in a way that we didn’t imagine.
Pal and his colleagues made their discovery while investigating tick immunity, which is a poorly understood area of tick biology. In their initial study, seeking to understand how tick immune systems recognize the-infected mouse or an uninfected mouse. Comparing the two groups, they found that the infected blood meal activated a protein in ticks that normally produces energy inside cells.
The researchers also found that the JAK/STAT receptor and pathway are important for normal tick development, even if the pathway is not activated by an infected blood meal. When Pal and his colleagues knocked down the expressed gene that produces the receptor for JAK/STAT, the ticks grew deformed legs, mouthparts, and digestive systems, and were unable to feed and complete the developmental cycle to grow further.
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