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Background  Tick-borne rickettsioses are considered important emerging zoonoses worldwide, but their etiological agents, rickettsiae, remain poorly characterized in northeastern China, where many human cases have been reported during the past several years. Here, we determined the characteristics of  Rickettsia  spp. infections in ticks in this area.    Methods  Ticks were collected by flagging vegetation from Jilin and Heilongjiang provinces of northeastern China followed by morphological identification. The presence of  Rickettsia  spp. in ticks was detected by PCR targeting the 23S-5S ribosomal RNA intergenic spacer, citrate synthase ( gltA ) gene, and 190-kDa outer membrane protein gene ( ompA ). The newly-generated sequences were subjected to phylogenetic analysis using the software MEGA 6.0.    Results  The overall infection rate of  Rickettsia  spp. was 6.12 %. Phylogenetic analyses based on the partial  gltA  and  ompA  genes demonstrated that rickettsiae detected in the ticks belong to four species, including “ Candidatus  Rickettsia tarasevichiae”,  Rickettsia heilongjiangensis ,  Rickettsia raoultii , and a potential new species isolate. The associated tick species were also identified, i.e.  Dermacentor nuttalli  and  Dermacentor silvarum  for  R. raoultii ,  Haemaphysalis concinna  and  Haemaphysalis longicornis  for  R. heilongjiangensis , and  Ixodes persulcatus  for “ Ca.  R. tarasevichiae”. All  Rickettsia  spp. showed significantly high infection rates in ticks from Heilongjiang when compared to Jilin Province.    Conclusion   Rickettsia heilongjiangensis ,  R. raoultii  and “ Ca.  R. tarasevichiae” are widely present in the associated ticks in northeastern China, but more prevalent in Heilongjiang Province. The data of this study increase the information on the distribution of  Rickettsia  spp. in northeastern China, which have important public health implications in consideration of their recent association with human diseases.    Electronic supplementary material  The online version of this article (doi:10.1186/s13071-016-1764-2) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

Characterization of rickettsiae in ticks in northeastern China