Abstract
West Africa is undergoing fast spread of the cattle tick associated with highest economic losses worldwide: Rhipicephalus (Boophilus) microplus, which was accidentally introduced in Benin and Côte d'Ivoire in early 2000s. In 2011, Burkinabe farmers complain about the impossibility of controlling very large infestations of their cattle by ticks (causing morbidity and loss of livestock weight): results of R. microplus infestation. This thesis has two key objectives for the determination of animal health protection measures. The first is to understand the mechanisms involved in this invasion by population genetic tools (e.g. tests of the existence of privileged invasions corridors, genetic structure of tick populations, population size estimates between introduction areas and invasion front, distance of gene flow by tick generation). Coupling these informations with those of resistance to the common acaricides used in farming will allow assessing of the most control strategies to stop current invasion. The second is to anticipate the impact of the invasion on the epidemiology of pathogens vectored by cattle ticks. It will be here first to assess the impact of the presence / absence of R. microplus (vector of Babesia bovis, B. bigemina and Anaplasma marginale) on the native cattle ticks’ communities.