CHESAPEAKE, Va. — As Virginia sees an uptick in tick-related illnesses, a “Roomba” type technology dubbed a TickBot may be the answer to fighting off the pesky parasites.
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A group of researchers at Old Dominion University — dubbed the ODU Tick Research Team — has set out to test a new technology intended to kill ticks without harming the surrounding environment or wildlife by using a remote-controlled “tick bot” on four wheels. The robot is armed with a cloth treated with permethrin, a chemical insecticide typically sprayed on military uniforms and boots, for example. The chemical is a neurotoxin that kills ticks within 45 minutes of exposure to the treated fabric while posing little risk to other critters.
“The huge advantage of this is that it’s self-contained, and the moving vehicle will scare off the most beneficial insects,” said Holly Gaff, who heads the tick research team and chairs the biological sciences department. “They’ll fly away from something moving.”
Since 2012, the researchers have collected at least 350,000 ticks across Hampton Roads in Virginia, aiming to better understand health risks, prevention strategies and diagnostics and treatment. Current efforts come as Virginia and most of the rest of America are seeing an increase in emergency hospital visits for tick bites.
Trails within The Preserve on the Elizabeth neighborhood in Chesapeake are among the first sites in the pilot program. Researchers also have tested the technology at Hoffler Creek Wildlife Preserve in Portsmouth and NASA’s Langley Research Center in Hampton.
The TickBot models a typical tick collection, which involves waving a white permethrin-treated cloth over vegetation and leaf litter where many ticks hang out to find a host. Researchers are relying on the Chesapeake neighborhood to test the technology so it can eventually be commercialized into an accessible tool for people to perhaps use in their own backyards. The ongoing research also helps to better understand the risks ticks pose to humans by studying their habits and pathogens.
A robot that operates on the ground is ideal — despite a common myth, ticks live and move on the ground, not in trees.
“From that initial idea of some very small-scale surveillance, it’s kind of blown up into this entire team of really understanding what’s going on in our neck of the woods,” Gaff said. “It’s kind of like Roomba for ticks in your backyard.”
Tick bites pose a significant health risk for pets and humans, spreading illnesses such as Lyme disease, Rocky Mountain spotted fever and alpha gal syndrome. In Virginia, the most common are blacklegged ticks, lone star ticks, American dog ticks, and Gulf Coast ticks.
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In the 2000s, Virginia became a “battleground” state for Lyme disease, which can cause rashes, fatigue, headaches, fevers, muscle and joint aches, and swollen lymph nodes that worsen if untreated. Rocky Mountain fever has some of the same symptoms and can even be fatal if untreated.
And another condition that needs more research but is an increased concern in Virginia is alpha gal syndrome. It can often be mistaken for food poisoning as it often results in a serious intolerance to red meat that sets in months after a tick bite. The reaction comes from a sugar carbohydrate found in ticks that’s foreign to humans, according to Emily Owens Pickle, an assistant professor in epidemiology, biostatistics, and environmental health in the Joint School of Public Health at Old Dominion University and Norfolk State University.
“(People are) mounting this allergic response to a carbohydrate, which is really weird, right? Not like a peanut allergy or a protein allergy that we usually see. So we don’t know a lot about how it works,” Pickle said. “Someone might be bit and not know it, right?
“The tick feeds and falls off. They don’t get sick, right? I’m in the clear. Then three months later, they have a hamburger, and they have severe abdominal pain, and they’re not breaking out in hives, but maybe they’re throwing up, and this is happening in the middle of the night.”
Virginia is home to many ticks thanks to migration across the Mid-Atlantic region and an abundance of white-tailed deer, Gaff said. Ticks also like humidity.
“They’re both really scrappy species, and so ecologically, it’s like this perfect storm for creating a habitat for them,” Pickle said.
Proper tick prevention includes wearing light-colored clothing so that ticks are easier to spot; tucking pants into socks; using tick repellent with permethrin; and using tick control medications for pets. To remove ticks, researchers say to use clean, fine-tipped tweezers or a tick removal spoon to grip the tick’s head and apply steady, upwards pressure to pull straight up.
ODU is asking the public to share any ticks they encounter and can collect. To learn more or arrange for researchers to pick up ticks free of charge, visit sites.wp.odu.edu/tick-team/.
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Natalie Anderson, 757-732-1133, [email protected]