Unravelling drug resistance: a population genetics investigation of the sheep scab mite, Psoroptes ovis
Supervisors:
Prof James Cotton, University of Glasgow
Dr Jennifer McIntyre, University of Glasgow
Dr Stewart Burgess, Moredun
Summary
Sheep scab, caused by the ectoparasitic mite Psoroptes ovis, is an infectious disease of small ruminants. It causes intense pruritus, pain and distress in infested animals and is highly contagious, making it a key welfare concern for farmed animals, with a severe economic burden of ~£80-200M per year to the UK farming industry in lost production and treatment costs. Farmers can use either organophosphate dips or injectable macrocyclic lactones (MLs) to control P. ovis mites. Recently, ML resistance was confirmed in the UK and is spreading widely.
Currently, several control programs are in place across the UK. The aim of these programs is to achieve long-term sustainable control of sheep scab in entire areas using, primarily, organophosphate plunge dipping. This project seeks to investigate changes in the mite populations in these programs over time, using population genetics to compare between populations and time points and investigating population size, diversity and ML resistance markers.
We have available a chromosomal-level P. ovis genome assembly and will use genome wide and targeted techniques to analyse these populations over both space and time. This interdisciplinary project provides a broad foundational training for research, including parasitological techniques, molecular biology, population genetics, bioinformatics techniques and knowledge exchange.