Detection of Sensu Lato and Relapsing Fever in Feeding Ticks and Rodents in Sarawak, Malaysia: New Geographical Records of and .

Members of the sensu lato (Bbsl) complex are etiological agents of Lyme disease (LD), and is one of the relapsing fever (RFB). Despite the serological evidence of LD in Malaysia, there has been no report from Sarawak, Malaysian Borneo. Thus, this study aimed to detect and characterize in rodents and ticks from primary forests and an oil palm (OP) plantation in Sarawak. (a member of the Bbsl complex) was detected in 43.8% (14/32) of ; most of the positive ticks were from the OP plantation (13/14). Out of 56 rodents, was detected in four spp. from the OP plantation and was detected in one rodent, , from the primary forest. Further, the positive samples of were randomly selected for multilocus sequence analysis (MLSA). The MLSA results of successfully amplified tick samples revealed a clustering with the sequences isolated from Japan and China. This study is the first evidence of , a known human pathogen in Malaysia, and , which is circulating in ticks and rodents in Sarawak, Malaysian Borneo, and presenting a new geographical record of the spp.