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Unprecedented genetic diversity suggests importance of understudied PFam54 paralogs to Lyme borreliosis spirochetes
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  • Janna Wülbern,
  • Laura Windorfer,
  • Kozue Sato,
  • Minoru Nakao,
  • Sabrina Hepner,
  • Gabriele MARGOS,
  • Volker Fingerle,
  • Hiroki Kawabata,
  • Noemie Becker,
  • Peter Kraiczy,
  • Robert Rollins
Janna Wülbern
Christian-Albrechts-Universitat zu Kiel
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Laura Windorfer
Technical University of Munich School of Life Sciences Weihenstephan
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Kozue Sato
National Institute of Infectious Diseases
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Minoru Nakao
Asahikawa Medical University Department of Parasitology
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Sabrina Hepner
Bavarian Health and Food Safety Authority Munich
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Gabriele MARGOS
Bavarian Health and Food Safety Authority Munich
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Volker Fingerle
Bavarian Health and Food Safety Authority Munich
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Hiroki Kawabata
National Institute of Infectious Diseases
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Noemie Becker
Ludwig-Maximilians-Universitat Munchen
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Peter Kraiczy
Hospital of the Goethe University Frankfurt Institute of Medical Microbiology and Infection Control
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Robert Rollins
Institute of Avian Research

Corresponding Author:[email protected]

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Abstract

Lyme borreliosis (LB) is the most common vector-borne disease in the Northern Hemisphere caused by spirochetes belonging to the Borrelia burgdorferi sensu lato (Bbsl) complex. Borrelia spirochetes circulate in obligatory transmission cycles between tick vectors and different vertebrate hosts. To successfully complete this complex transmission cycle, Bbsl encode for an arsenal of proteins including the PFam54 protein family with known, or proposed, influences to reservoir host and/or vector adaptation. Even so, only fragmentary information is available regarding the naturally occurring level of variation in the PFam54 gene array and its impact on Borrelia pathogenesis. Utilizing whole genome data from isolates (n=141) originated from the three major LB-causing Borrelia species across Eurasia (B. afzelii, B. bavariensis, and B. garinii), we aimed to characterize the diversity of the PFam54 gene array in these isolates to facilitate understanding the evolution of PFam54 orthologs on an intra- and interspecies level. We found an extraordinarily high level of variation in the PFam54 gene array with 39 PFam54 paralogs belonging to 23 orthologous groups including five novel paralogs. Even so, the gene array appears to have remained fairly stable over the evolutionary history of these Borrelia species. Interestingly, genes outside Clade IV previously associated with host or, proposed, vector adaptation more frequently displayed signatures of diversifying selection. Taken together, our findings support the idea that non-Clade IV orthologs could play a larger role in host and/or vector adaptation than previously thought.
May 2024Published in Ecology and Evolution volume 14 issue 5. https://doi.org/10.1002/ece3.11397