Conference Agenda

Scabies is a neglected tropical disease affecting approximately 400 million people globally. The obligate lifecycle of Sarcoptes scabiei has limited our understanding of its biology, largely due to difficulties in maintaining the parasite outside its host. The development of an ex-vivo culture system has facilitated improved investigation of the mite’s complex biology. With the known prevalence of symbionts amongst haematophagous arthropods and the strong association with secondary bacterial infections, this study has attempted to provide the first life-stage specific microbiota and to identify core components of the S. scabiei microbiota. Over 48,000 individual parasites were collected across five key life-stages (eggs, larvae, nymphs, males and females). 16S full-length rRNA amplicon sequencing was performed on the PacBio platform. A total of 3,500,187 reads and 487 amplicon sequence variants (ASVs) were identified. The genera Corynebacterium, Serratia and Acinetobacter were present across all life-stages with the opportunistic pathogens Acinetobacter baumannii and Serratia marcescens identified as key constituents of the scabies microbiome. This study provides the first evidence of a stable core microbiota across all life stages of S. scabiei, offering new insights that could improve understanding of mite biology and management of scabies and associated secondary bacterial infections.