2.2. DNA isolation, amplification and sequencing
Cysticercus DNA was extracted using a commercial kit as instructed by the manufacturer (Blood and Tissue Kit, Qiagen, Germany). The mt genomes of Taenia spp., whose intermediate hosts include rodents, downloaded from GenBank (Supplementary Table S2) were aligned by using MEGA 7.0. Nine overlapping primers targeting the complete mt genome were designed using Oligo 6.0 at relatively conserve regions observed on alignment of the mt genome sequences. The primer sequences (Supplementary Table S1) were synthesized by Genewiz Biotech (Beijing, China). A standard 50 µl PCR protocol was used to amplify the mtDNA fragments. PCR products were purified directly from an agarose gel (1%) using an Axy Prep™ DNA Gel Extraction Kit (AXVGEN, USA) and then sent to the company Genewiz Biotech for sequencing.