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HEIndividual fellowship2023–2025

VIRULENCE · Assessing the (co)dissemination of virulence and antibiotic resistance genes in resource recovery applications

Horizon Europe — Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions

Duration
2023-06-01 → 2025-05-31
EU contribution
€211,755
Participants
1
Scheme
HORIZON-TMA-MSCA-PF-EF

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Results in brief

Assessing the (co)dissemination of virulence and antibiotic resistance genes in resource recovery applications

The current linear economic model of production and consumption leads to significant resource depletion and waste accumulation, highlighting the urgent need to transition toward a circular economy. In this context, recovering resources by using treated organic waste and reclaimed water in agriculture offers great potential for recycling nutrients and water. However, these practices also carry risks by potentially spreading antibiotic-resistant pathogens, and their associated virulence genes and antibiotic resistance genes, which worsen the global health crisis. While efforts exist to control antimicrobial resistance, the role and fate of virulence genes remain largely unexplored. This project aims to address critical knowledge gaps about how new resource recovery technologies affect the dissemination and mitigation of virulence genes and antibiotic resistance genes. Specifically, the project pursued the following objectives: 1) Characterize the presence, co-occurrence, and persistence of virulence and antibiotic resistance genes throughout wastewater treatment plants, examining how different treatment processes influence their removal or dissemination. 2) Evaluate the effectiveness of solid waste treatment technologies (e.g., composting and anaerobic digestion) in reducing virulence and antibiotic resistance genes, and study the risks linked to their presence and transfer after applying treated biosolids to agricultural soils. 3) Investigate the horizontal gene transfer processes that allow virulence and antibiotic resistance genes to move from microbial communities in treatment systems to environmental bacteria. By understanding the fate of these genes during waste and wastewater treatment and their potential impact on ecosystems, this project has helped to develop safer and more effective strategies to manage health risks while promoting sustainable resource recovery.

Data: CORDIS, © European Union

Project objective

The secret behind a successful pathogenic bacteria lies on achieving the perfect balance between virulence and resistance. Virulence genes (VGs) and antibiotic resistance genes (ARGs) can be co-localized in the same mobile genetic element, and thus can be transmitted together in a single horizontal gene transfer event. In the last decades, the number of bacteria carrying VGs and ARGs has increased significantly, and their dissemination is amongst the greatest global threats to human health. These genes are released into the environment during the discharge of treated wastewater and via the recycling of organic waste products. Considering that human, animal, and environment health are interconnected under the One Health concept, limiting their dissemination into the environment by implementing effective waste/wastewater treatment technologies is a major option for limiting the emergence of these pathogens. Despite the research efforts focused on ARGs, the spread of VGs has barely been studied, omitting a huge problem that cannot be separated from antimicrobial resistance. This proposal will address both fundamental and applied aspects of the problematic. Fundamentally, this proposal will provide a more comprehensive overview of the diversity of VGs (and their co-occurrence with ARGs) in the wastewater treatment network and will study their (co)transferability within complex microbial communities. In addition, this project will study, for the first time, the fate of VGs (and their co-occurrence with ARGs) during/after waste/wastewater treatment, also assessing the impact of different operational parameters on their mitigation. Particular attention will be paid to the impact that potential approaches allowing resource recovery (e.g., nutrient and carbon recovery through manure/sludge application as fertiliser) on VGs/ARGs dissemination. With the emergence of superbugs being one of the main human health threats that we face, the importance of this proposal is obvious.

Original text from CORDIS.

Participants

  • INSTITUT NATIONAL DE RECHERCHE POUR L'AGRICULTURE, L'ALIMENTATION ET L'ENVIRONNEMENT · ParisCoordinatorFrance

Links

Data: CORDIS, © European Union