Table 3. ESTs matching to the rrnL gene, and rrnL ESTs with a polyA stretch corresponding to the polyA tail of the mature rrnL transcript.

Taxon	Species	Available ESTsa	rrnL ESTs	polyA ESTsb	polyA start at:		mtDNAc
					5′-end of Tick-Box	Other
Prostriata	Ixodes ricinus	1,969	23	13	13	0	This study
Prostriata	Ixodes scapularis	193,773	33	8	8	0	AB161439
Argasidae	Ornithodoros coriaceus	923	20	5	4	1	congeneric
Metastriata	Amblyomma americanum	6,480	852	30	30	0	congeneric
Metastriata	Amblyomma rotundatum	1,230	18	14	12	2	congeneric
Metastriata	Amblyomma tuberculatum	387	17	2	2	0	congeneric
Metastriata	Hyalomma anatolicum	736	5	5	2	3	congeneric
Metastriata	Hyalomma marginatum	2,110	27	24	18	6	congeneric
Metastriata	Dermacentor andersoni	1,387	67	25	16	9	congeneric
Metastriata	Boophilus microplus	52,901	296	130	115	15	AF110619
Metastriata	Rhipicephalus sanguineus	2,899	428	57	50	7	NC_002074
Xiphosura	Limulus polyphemus	8,488	2	2	0	2	NC_003057

^aESTs publicly available at 20 Feb, 2012.

^bESTs with a terminal polyA stretch >10 bp, mapping to the end of rrnL. Polyadenylated ESTs mapping well inside the rrnL gene have not been considered, as they are mostly cDNA artefacts originated from the annealing of the oligo-dT primer to an A-rich inner gene region during the cDNA first strand synthesis.

^caccession number of the mt genomic sequence, if available. “Congeneric” means that only the sequence of a congeneric species is available, as reported in Table S1.