Fig 1.
A map of Uganda indicating sites from where pools of ticks were collected and tested for Rickettsia spp. Those tested negative (white circle) and positive (blue circle) are indicated.
This map was generated using QGIS 3.28 with the base map accessible at https://data.unhcr.org/en/documents/details/83043.
Fig 2.
Distribution of ticks by collection district and host.
The total number of ticks collected in each district is listed below the respective district name. The outer circle represents the percentage of each tick species from the respective district. The inner circle represents the host distribution of each respective tick species. The total host distribution by district is shown by the percentages in the middle. Livestock includes the chicken recorded from Gulu district. Labels for percentages less than or equal to 1 were excluded.
Table 1.
Maximum Likelihood Estimates (MLE) and Minimum Infection Rate (MIR) with corresponding 95% confidence intervals for detection rates of Rickettsia spp. in all tick pools.
Fig 3.
Maximum likelihood tree of the 17kDa Rickettsia spp. gene using the Tamura-Nei model with sequences ranging from 192 to 426bp.
Values less than 70% were excluded from the tree. The legend shows the tick species from which the Rickettsia spp. shown in this tree were detected. The legend shows the source of isolation by tick species and tick host by symbol. If multiple source icons appear next to an accession number, the pool of ticks came from more than one source. *One sample, MZ545592.1 was isolated from human serum and not from a tick. All GenBank accession numbers beginning with OP were sequenced in this study.
Fig 4.
Maximum likelihood tree of the ompA Rickettsia spp. gene using the Tamura-Nei model with sequence lengths ranging from 545 to 590bp.
Values less than 70% were excluded from the tree. The legend shows the tick species from which the Rickettsia spp. shown in this tree were detected. The legend shows the source of isolation by tick species and tick host by symbol. If multiple source icons appear next to an accession number, the pool of ticks came from more than one source. *One sample, MZ545592.1 was isolated from human serum and not from a tick. All GenBank accession numbers beginning with OP were sequenced in this study.
Table 2.
Rickettsia spp. identified with the corresponding GenBank accession numbers and identity to sequences on GenBank.