A global dataset of microbial community in ticks from metagenome study

Ticks are important vectors of various zoonotic pathogens that can infect animals and humans, and most documented tick-borne pathogens have a strong bias towards microorganisms with strong disease phenotypes. The recent development of next-generation sequencing (NGS) has enabled the study of microbial communities, referred to as microbiome. Herein, we undertake a systema[TM1] tic review of published literature to build a comprehensive global dataset of reports on the diversity and distribution of microbiome by NGS in field-collected ticks. The dataset comprised 4418 records (76 literature) of geo-referenced occurrences for 47 species of ticks and 219 microorganism families, revealing a total of 83 [TM2] emerging viruses identified from 6 tick genera and 24 tick species since 1980. The viral, bacterial and eukaryotic composition was compared regarding the tick species, their live stage and types of the specimens, or the geographic location. The data can assist the further investigation of ecological, biogeographical and epidemiological features of the tick-borne disease.