Gray Matters: A Tick by Any Other Name Still Causes Lyme Disease

Summary

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There aren't a lot of reference books on the etymology of entomology, which is a pity, because most insects and ararchnids have seemingly meaningful Latin names. Before people worry about that, however, they should agree on nomenclature for the tick that transmits Lyme disease.

It used to be called Ixodes damini, the deer tick. Then entomologists, or rather the experts who study ticks and fleas, determined that damini was the same species as scapularis, already called the black-legged tick.

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Gray Matters: A Tick by Any Other Name Still Causes Lyme Disease

So Ixodes damini, the deer tick, became Ixodes scapularis, the black-legged tick. Not that everyone has gone along with the name change.

Dependi...

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