Detection of spp. in foxes' populations in Piedmont and Aosta Valley (NW Italy) coupling geospatially-based techniques.

is a genus of bacteria known to cause various rare but potentially dangerous diseases in humans and wildlife. The objective of this study was to investigate the presence of spp. in red foxes () from Piedmont and Aosta Valley (NW Italy) and to explore the potential association between environmental humidity and infection using remote sensing data. A total of 114 spleen samples were collected from hunted red foxes and screened for spp. DNA using a qPCR assay targeting the locus. Samples that tested positive were further analyzed using end-point PCR to detect the , and loci. The overall prevalence of spp. infection was found to be 7.9% (9/114), with a prevalence of 6.9% (7/101) in foxes from Piedmont and 15.4% (2/13) in foxes from Aosta Valley. Sequencing results identified R1 as the most commonly isolated species (5/9, 62.5%), followed by Candidatus "" in two samples (2/9, 28.6%). To investigate the relationship between environmental factors and infection, data from NASA USGS Landsat missions (TOA collection) from 2011 to 2022 were processed using Google Earth Engine. The Tasseled Cap Wetness Index (TCW), an indicator of landscape moisture, was calculated for each meteorological season. The study found that spp. infections in foxes were positively associated with higher TCW values (>0.7). Canonical Correspondence Analysis further demonstrated a strong link between pathogen prevalence and municipal-level TCW, suggesting that TCW could be used as a parameter to facilitate disease management and control. This study provides a starting point for a more comprehensive epidemiological assessment of spp. on a national scale and highlights the potential role of environmental humidity in influencing pathogen distribution.