Borrelia burgdorferi

Borrelia burgdorferi is species of bacteria of the spirochete class of the genus Borrelia. B. burgdorferi is predominant in North America, but also exists in Europe, and is the agent of Lyme disease.

It is a zoonotic, vector-borne disease transmitted by ticks and is named after the researcher Willy Burgdorfer who first isolated the bacterium in 1982. B. burgdorferi is one of the few pathogenic bacteria that can survive without iron, having replaced all of its iron-sulphur cluster enzymes with enzymes that use manganese, thus avoiding the problem many pathogenic bacteria face in acquiring iron.

B. burgdorferi infections have been linked to non-Hodgkin lymphomas.