Detection of the emerging tick-borne pathogen, Tamdy virus, in<i> Dermacentor</i><i> marginatus</i> ticks, southeastern Türkiye

DİNÇER E., TİMURKAN M. Ö.

REVISTA BRASILEIRA DE PARASITOLOGIA VETERINARIA, vol.35, no.1, 2026 (SCI-Expanded, Scopus)

Abstract

Tamdy virus (TAMV) is an emerging tick-borne virus in the family Nairoviridae, identified as a human pathogen causing febrile illness after tick exposure. This study aimed to detect and characterise TAMV in ticks collected from non-endemic regions of T & uuml;rkiye. A total of 529 ticks were sampled from six provinces and identified as Haemaphysalis parva (27%), Rhipicephalus bursa (26%), Haemaphysalis punctata (20.7%), Dermacentor marginatus (17.2%), and Ixodes ricinus (8.8%). Screening with a single-step generic PCR revealed one TAMV-positive pool out of 96. For characterisation, the S segment ofTAMVwas amplified using two primer sets. Phylogenetic analyses of the partial Lgene and full S segment showed that the sequence from Osmaniye sample clustered closelywith the TT1 isolatefrom Konya,T & uuml;rkiye. Amino acid comparison indicated that Turkish isolates were more similar to each other than to thosefrom Russia and China,forming a distinct clade within TAMV. Minor amino acid differences between the Turkish isolates suggest that TAMV diversity in T & uuml;rkiye is shaped by internal evolution rather than external introductions. These findings highlight the importance of continuous surveillance of tick-borne zoonotic viruses and suggest that TAMV may have a wider vector range and geographic distribution than previously recognised.