Acquisition of exogenous haem is essential for tick reproduction
- Biology Centre CAS, Czech Republic
- Institute of Microbiology CAS, Czech Republic
- Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
Abstract
Haem and iron homeostasis in most eukaryotic cells is based on a balanced flux between haem biosynthesis and haem oxygenase-mediated degradation.Unlike most eukaryotes, ticks possess an incomplete haem biosynthetic pathway and, together with other (non-haematophagous) mites, lack a gene encoding haem oxygenase. We demonstrated, by membrane feeding, that ticks do not acquire bioavailable iron from haemoglobin-derived haem. However, ticks require dietary haemoglobin as an exogenous source of haem since, feeding with haemoglobin-depleted serum led to aborted embryogenesis. Supplementation of serum with haemoglobin fully restored egg fertility. Surprisingly, haemoglobin could be completely substituted by serum proteins for the provision of amino-acids in vitellogenesis. Acquired haem is distributed by haemolymph carrier protein(s) and sequestered by vitellins in the developing oocytes.This work extends, substantially, current knowledge of haem auxotrophy in ticks and underscores the importance of haem and iron metabolism as rational targets for anti-tick interventions.
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Ethics
Animal experimentation: All laboratory animals were treated in accordancewith the Animal Protection Law of the Czech Republic No. 246/1992 Sb., ethics approval No.095/2012.
Copyright
© 2016, Perner et al.
This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License permitting unrestricted use and redistribution provided that the original author and source are credited.
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Acquisition of exogenous haem is essential for tick reproduction
eLife 5:e12318.
https://doi.org/10.7554/eLife.12318
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