Rhipicephalus

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Rhipicephalus
Rhipicephalus sanguineus.jpg
Rhipicephalus sanguineus
Scientific classification OOjs UI icon edit-ltr.svg
Domain: Eukaryota
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Arthropoda
Subphylum: Chelicerata
Class: Arachnida
Order: Ixodida
Family: Ixodidae
Genus: Rhipicephalus
Koch, 1844 [1]
Type species
Ixodes sanguineus
Latreille, 1806
Species

About 74–75 species, see text.

Rhipicephalus is a genus of ticks in the family Ixodidae, the hard ticks, consisting of about 74 or 75 species. [2] [3] Most are native to tropical Africa. [2]

Contents

Rhipicephalus ticks are commonly called 'the brown tick' as they are mostly brown in colour. [4] Most adult ticks in this genus do not have colour patterns on their scutum (inornate). [4] This makes the species difficult to distinguish from one another because most are quite similar, but individuals of one particular species can be quite variable. [3] [4] Ticks have traditionally been identified by examination of distinctive morphological features. Most of the characteristics used to identify species pertain to male specimens. [3] The immature and female specimens are sometimes simply impossible to identify due to the lack of differential morphological features. [3] [4] [5]

Many Rhipicephalus spp. are of economic, medical, and veterinary importance because of their blood feeding lifestyle. They are possible vectors of many pathogens in humans and animals. They can transmit pathogens that cause animal and human diseases, such as East Coast fever, anaplasmosis, babesiosis, rickettsiosis, [2] Boutonneuse fever, Lyme disease, Q fever, Rocky Mountain spotted fever, and Crimean–Congo hemorrhagic fever. [6] In addition to the infectious agents spread by ticks, tick bites can lead to allergic and toxic reactions. [7] [8] A toxic reaction occur when they inject a neurotoxin with their bite that leads to tick-caused paralysis. [2] [8]

Boophilus was once considered a separate genus, but studies in the early 2000s resulted in Boophilus being made a subgenus of Rhipicephalus. [9] Although Boophilus has been included in the Rhipicephalus genus, their morphology is different from the typical Rhipicephalus species. [5]

Species familiar in the domestic environment include the brown dog tick (R. sanguineus).

Sex pheromone studies

A number of Rhipicephalus spp. females produce phenol and p-cresol after being fed for six days. These compounds may act as sex pheromones since these compounds were shown to be the sex pheromone of Rhipicephalus appendiculatus. [10]

Etymology

The name Rhipicephalus is derived from the Greek word rhiphis, meaning "fan-like",[ citation needed ] and κεφαλή, kephalē, meaning "head". The two terms are related to the hexagonal basis capituli of Rhipicephalus.

Epidemiology

Rhipicephalus bursa is a carrier of babesiosis, theileriosis and anaplasmosis in domestic animals, of the Nairobi sheep disease, and an aggressive vector of the agents of the Crimean–Congo hemorrhagic fever and of the Q fever. [11]

Species

Subgenus Boophilus

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<i>Ixodes</i> Genus of ticks

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<i>Amblyomma</i> Genus of ticks

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<i>Dermacentor</i> Genus of ticks

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<i>Rhipicephalus microplus</i> Species of tick

The Asian blue tick is an economically important tick that parasitises a variety of livestock and wild mammal species, especially cattle, on which it is the most economically significant ectoparasite in the world. It is known as the Australian cattle tick, southern cattle tick, Cuban tick, Madagascar blue tick, and Puerto Rican Texas fever tick.

<i>Haemaphysalis</i> Genus of ticks

Haemaphysalis is a genus of ticks, containing these species:

Jane Brotherton Walker was a Kenyan-South African scholar in the field of tick taxonomy, particularly in Africa.

Rhipicephalus hoogstraali is a tick found in Djibouti and Somalia. First recognized by Harry Hoogstraal as Rhipicephalus longicoxatus based on an incomplete published description, after discovery of the holotype of R. longicoxatus, it was described and named to honor Hoogstraal in 2009.

<i>Hyalomma dromedarii</i> Species of tick

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<i>Rhipicephalus annulatus</i> Species of tick

Rhipicephalus annulatus, the cattle tick, is a hard-bodied tick of the genus Rhipicephalus. It is also known as North American cattle tick, North American Texas fever tick, and Texas fever tick.

<i>Amblyomma rhinocerotis</i> Species of tick

Amblyomma rhinocerotis is a species of tick belonging to the family Ixodidae. [2][3][4] The species was first discovered in 1778 in the southern parts of Africa; however it disappeared in the 1970s before reappearing again in 2017 in the northern parts of Africa. It is primarily a rhino parasite. [5]

<i>Rhipicephalus pulchellus</i> Species of tick

The zebra tick or yellow back tick is a species of hard tick. It is common in the Horn of Africa, with a habitat of the Rift Valley and eastward. It feeds upon a wide variety of species, including livestock, wild mammals, and humans, and can be a vector for various pathogens. The adult male has a distinctive black and ivory ornamentation on its scutum.

<i>Rhipicephalus appendiculatus</i> Species of tick

Rhipicephalus appendiculatus, the brown ear tick, is a hard tick found in Africa where it spreads the parasite Theileria parva, the cause of East Coast fever in cattle. The tick has a three-host life-cycle, spending around 10% of its life feeding on animals. The most common host species include buffalo, cattle, and large antelope, but R. appendiculatus is also found on other animals, such as hares, dogs, and warthogs.

Rhipicephalus gertrudae is a species of tick in the family Ixodidae. The specific epithet honors South African parasitologist Dr. Gertrud Theiler. The species was first circumscribed by Dr. Brouria Feldman-Muhsam.

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<i>Cosmiomma</i> Genus of ticks

Cosmiomma is a genus of ticks first discovered by Paul Schulze in 1919. It is monospecific, being represented by the single species Cosmiomma hippopotamensis. It was first described in 1843 by Henry Denny from specimens collected from a hippopotamus in Southern Africa, and has been called "one of the most unusual, beautiful, and rare tick species known to the world."

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Natalia Aleksandrovna Filippova</span> USSR-Russian acarologist

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References

  1. ↑ Koch, C. L. (1844). "Systematische Übersicht über die Ordnung der Zecken". Archiv für Naturgeschichte. 10 (1): 238–239.
  2. 1 2 3 4 Olwoch, J. M., et al. (2007). Climate change and the genus Rhipicephalus (Acari: Ixodidae) in Africa. Onderstepoort J Vet Res 74(1), 45-72.
  3. 1 2 3 4 Beati, L. and J. E. Keirans. (2001). Analysis of the systematic relationships among ticks of the genera Rhipicephalus and Boophilus (Acari: Ixodidae) based on mitochondrial 12S ribosomal DNA gene sequences and morphological characters. The Journal of Parasitology 87(1), 32.
  4. 1 2 3 4 Walker, J.B., Keirans, J.E. & Horak, I.G. (2000). The Genus Rhipicephalus (Acari, Ixodidae): A Guide to the Brown Ticks of the World. Cambridge University Press. ISBN   0-521-48008-6.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  5. 1 2 The Ixodid Ticks (Acari: Ixodidae) of Southern Africa. doi:10.1007/978-3-319-70642-9.
  6. ↑ Rhipicephalus. Tick Identification Key. University of Lincoln.
  7. ↑ Ahmed, Jabbar; Alp, Hatice; Aksin, Muhammed; Seitzer, Ulrike (2007). "Current status of ticks in Asia". Parasitology Research. 101 (S2): 159–162. doi:10.1007/s00436-007-0696-3. ISSN   0932-0113.
  8. 1 2 Daniel E. Sonenshine, R. Michael Roe (2014). Overview: Ticks, People, and Animals in Biology of ticks, Volume 1 (Second ed.). Oxford University Press. ISBN   978-0-19-937927-9. OCLC   862106136.
  9. ↑ Murrell, Anna; Barker, Stephen C. (2003). "Synonymy of Boophilus Curtice, 1891 with Rhipicephalus Koch, 1844 (Acari: Ixodidae)". Systematic Parasitology. 56 (3): 169–172. doi:10.1023/B:SYPA.0000003802.36517.a0. PMID   14707501. S2CID   995415.
  10. ↑ Wood, William F.; Leahy, Mary G..; Galun, R.; Prestwich, G. D.; Meinwald, J.; Purnell, R. E.; Payne, J. (1975). "Phenols as Sex Pheromones of Ixodid Ticks: A General Phenomen?". J. Chemical Ecology. 1: 501–509. doi:10.1007/BF00988590.
  11. ↑ Arnaudov1, Atanas D.; Arnaudov, Dimo Y. (January 1, 2017). "Ixodid Ticks on Domestic Ruminants: an Investigation in the Valley of Maritsa River in Plovdiv Region, Bulgaria". Acta Zoologica Bulgarica (Suppl. 8): 223. ISSN   0324-0770. OCLC   7091676742.{{cite journal}}: CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)
  12. ↑ Apanaskevich, D. A., et al. 2013. A new species of Rhipicephalus (Acari: Ixodidae), a parasite of Red River hogs and domestic pigs in the Democratic Republic of Congo. Journal of Medical Entomology 50(3), 479-84.
  13. ↑ Kitaoka, Shigeo; Suzuki, Hiroshi (1983). "Studies on the Parasite Fauna of Thailand: 5. Parasitic ticks on mammals and description of Ixodes siamensis sp. n. and Rhipicephalus tetracornus sp. n. (Acarina: Ixodidae)". Tropical Medicine. 25 (4): 205–219. hdl: 10069/4366 .
  14. ↑ Guglielmone, Alberto A.; Robbins, Richard G.; Apanaskevich, Dmitry A.; Petney, Trevor N.; Estrada-Peña, Agustín; Horak, Ivan G. (2009). "Comments on controversial tick (Acari: Ixodida) species names and species described or resurrected from 2003 to 2008" (PDF). Experimental and Applied Acarology. 48 (4): 311–327. doi:10.1007/s10493-009-9246-2. hdl: 2263/13757 . PMID   19169832. S2CID   29053875.

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