AEM Accepts, published online ahead of print on 2 November 2007

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Appl. Environ. Microbiol. doi:10.1128/AEM.01567-07
Copyright (c) 2007, American Society for Microbiology and/or the Listed Authors/Institutions. All Rights Reserved.

Fitness variation of Borrelia burgdorferi sensu stricto strains in mice

Klára Hanincová^*, Nicholas H. Ogden, Maria Diuk-Wasser, Christopher J. Pappas, Radha Iyer, Durland Fish, Ira Schwartz, and Klaus Kurtenbach

Department of Epidemiology and Public Health, Yale School of Medicine, Yale University, 60 College St, New Haven, CT 06520, USA; Public Health Agency of Canada, Foodborne, Waterborne and Zoonotic Infections Divisions, Center for Infectious Disease Prevention and Control, FMV, Université de Montréal, C.P. 5000, Saint-Hyacinthe (Québec) J2S 7C6, Canada; Department of Microbiology and Immunology, New York Medical College, Valhalla, NY 10595, USA

^* To whom correspondence should be addressed. Email: klara_hanincova{at}nymc.edu.

Lyme borreliosis in North America is caused by the tick-borne spirochete Borrelia burgdorferi, a zoonotic bacterium that is able to persistently infect a wide range of vertebrate species. Given the pronounced strain structure of B. burgdorferi in the northeastern U.S., we asked whether the fitness of the different genotypes varies among susceptible vertebrate hosts. The transmission dynamics of two genetically divergent human isolates of B. burgdorferi, BL206 and B348, were analyzed experimentally in white-footed mice and in C3H/HeNCrl mice over a time period of almost three months. We found that the initially high transmission efficiency from white-footed mice to ticks declined sharply for isolate B348, but remained considerably high for isolate BL206. In contrast, in C3H/HeNCrl mice, high transmission efficiency persisted for both isolates. Our findings provide proof-of-principle evidence for intrinsic fitness variation of B. burgdorferi strains in vertebrate host species, perhaps indicating the beginnings of adaptive radiation.

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