Lizards May Lessen Lyme Disease

Adapted From : - www.healthypets.in

Today's Topic : - Lizards May Lessen Lyme Disease

Scientists have found that ticks who feast on the blood of the common western fence lizard are purged of Lyme disease bacteria within their gut. It is thought that a protein in the lizard's blood destroys the bacteria that would otherwise thrive in the belly of the tick and would later be transmitted to humans. The protein is yet to be identified

Robert Lane, an insect biologist at UC Berkeley and his colleague conducted laboratory experiments using young Lyme disease-infected ticks and fence lizards. The ticks are about the size of a poppy seed in the nymphal stage, during which they feed on the blood of the lizards. Commonly found are 30 to 40 ticks at one time sharing the blood of a single fence lizard. Though the infected adult female ticks threaten to transmit Lyme disease to humans, the smaller nymphal ticks are most jeopardous because they are hard to find and also capable of transmitting the disease.

Lyme Disease Killing Protein

Test tube experiments revealed that Lyme disease bacteria soaked with lizard's blood died within one hour, compared to samples grown in mouse blood which lasted three days. Researchers heated lizard blood to the boiling point and discovered it no longer killed the bacteria in the test tube. Lab tests showed that after infected nymphs fed on lizards and then metamorphosed into adult ticks, they were no longer infected.
The sum of these results indicates what Lane called a "spirochete-killing factor" which is likely a large protein. Researchers are now attempting to determine the exact nature of the Lyme disease killing protein. Once found, the hope is it will be useful in creating a treatment for the disease.