A NOVEL MODIFICATION TO THE CLIMBING TEST: APPLYING IR3535, DEET AND ICARIDIN AGAINST IXODES PERSULCATUS

About authors:

Disinfectology Institute of the Federal Scientific Center of Hygiene named after F. F. Erisman of the Federal Service for the Oversight of Consumer Protection and Welfare, Moscow, Russia

Disinfectology Institute of the Federal Scientific Center of Hygiene named after F. F. Erisman of the Federal Service for the Oversight of Consumer Protection and Welfare, Moscow, Russia;
X-BIO Institute, Tyumen State University, Tyumen, Russia;
Kurnakov Institute of General and Inorganic Chemistry, Russian Academy of Sciences, Moscow, Russia

Disinfectology Institute of the Federal Scientific Center of Hygiene named after F. F. Erisman of the Federal Service for the Oversight of Consumer Protection and Welfare, Moscow, Russia

Disinfectology Institute of the Federal Scientific Center of Hygiene named after F. F. Erisman of the Federal Service for the Oversight of Consumer Protection and Welfare, Moscow, Russia

Disinfectology Institute of the Federal Scientific Center of Hygiene named after F. F. Erisman of the Federal Service for the Oversight of Consumer Protection and Welfare, Moscow, Russia

Disinfectology Institute of the Federal Scientific Center of Hygiene named after F. F. Erisman of the Federal Service for the Oversight of Consumer Protection and Welfare, Moscow, Russia

School of Material Science and Engineering, Nanyang Technological University (NTU), Singapore, the Republic of Singapore

Acknowledgments:

The work was funded by the state budget of the Russian Federation, as part of the 2026–2030 research program (No. 126030218221-8).

Trials involving volunteers were conducted according to the rules of the Ethics Committee of Disinfectology Institute of “FSCH named after F. F. Erisman” of Rospotrebnadzor.

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

Abstract:

Ixodid ticks are vectors of dangerous infectious diseases. Repellents are long-standing means of protecting humans against arthropod infestations. However, currently, there is no universally accepted method for evaluating the repellent effects of substances and materials on the ixodid ticks. In this study, a novel variant of the climbing test is proposed. It involves the treatment of two strips with a test substance and the subsequent evaluation of tick behaviour on human volunteers. The approach was subjected to a trial under natural conditions with taiga ticks (Ixodes persulcatus) collected in the Irkutskaya Oblast of Russia, near Lake Baikal. The experiments were carried out with commonly used synthetic repellents (DEET, IR3535 and icaridin) at various concentrations. Two experimental strips were used: the first 10-cm-wide strip of repellent-treated fabric was attached to the volunteer’s leg, 10 cm above the foot. This strip was followed by a 10 cm buffer zone, after which the second treated strip was attached. The total climbing distance was 40 cm. Each trial was limited to 10 minutes, which corresponds to the typical time required for ticks to climb this distance in the absence of repellents. Female I. persulcatus were used in the experiments either on the day they were collected or the next day. A ranking system was developed to assess the repellent’s efficacy. The proposed method can be used to evaluate the effectiveness of new repellent substances, as well as the protective properties of clothing treated with them.

DOI: 10.21684/0132-8077-2026-34-1-115-121

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