About the Project
This project is one of a number that are in competition for funding from the NERC Great Western Four+ Doctoral Training Partnership (GW4+ DTP). The GW4+ DTP consists of the Great Western Four alliance of the University of Bath, University of Bristol, Cardiff University and the University of Exeter plus six Research Organisation partners: British Antarctic Survey, British Geological Survey, Centre for Ecology and Hydrology, the Met Office, the Natural History Museum and Plymouth Marine Laboratory. The partnership aims to provide a broad training in earth and environmental sciences, designed to train tomorrow’s leaders in earth and environmental science. For further details about the programme, please see http://nercgw4plus.ac.uk/.
At least 37 fully-funded studentships that encompass the breadth of earth and environmental sciences are being offered to start in September 2017 across the GW4+ DTP.
This project will be based within the Department of Biology and Biochemistry at the University of Bath (UK) in the new Milner Centre for Evolution (http://www.bath.ac.uk/groups/milner-centre-for-evolution/). The student will gain expertise in both experimental and bioinformatic approaches and have access to excellent research facilities.
Supervisors:
Main supervisor - Prof Edward Feil (University of Bath)
Co-supervisor(s) - Dr Barbara Kasprzyk-Hordern (University of Bath), Dr Katy Turner (University of Bristol), Dr David Verner-Jeffries (Cefas, Weymouth), Dr Ioanna Katsiadaki (Cefas, Weymouth)
CASE Partner: Cefas (Weymouth).
The successful student will be hosted by Cefas for up to 18 months during the course of the PhD when he/she will undertake work outside the academic environment.
Project description:
Antimicrobial resistance (AMR) has, in September 2016, been described by the 193 nations of the UN as ‘the biggest threat to modern medicine’ (1,2). Despite strict controls in the UK on the use and supply of antibiotics in agriculture and aquaculture, waste from antibiotic production facilities, runoff from agricultural land and inadequate wastewater.
Antimicrobial resistance (AMR) has, in September 2016, been described by the 193 nations of the UN as ‘the biggest threat to modern medicine’ (1,2). Despite strict controls in the UK on the use and supply of antibiotics in agriculture and aquaculture, waste from antibiotic production facilities, runoff from agricultural land and inadequate wastewater treatment facilities all contribute to the accumulation of antibiotics in the environment imposing selection for resistance. The resultant spread of AMR has clear implications for human and animal health, with humans being routinely exposed to antibiotic resistant bacteria from the environment via the food chain. However, our ability to gauge the gravity of this threat, and to develop focused AMR risk mitigation strategies, is currently limited by key knowledge gaps. These include a lack of data on the fate and degradation processes of antibiotics in the environment, and uncertainty as to what extent exposure to even very low (sub-inhibitory) concentrations of these compounds impacts on the spread of resistance within microbial communities associated with farmed species destined for human consumption (3).
This project will address these questions with a view to ultimately informing on the risk to human health from low level environmental contamination of antibiotics via the consumption of contaminated farmed animals, using oysters as an exemplar. We will deploy a novel approach at the interface of microbial ecology (both in the environment and in a model system), environmental chemistry, and mathematical modelling. In order to first ascertain base-line environmental data, samples of both fresh and sea water (including effluent from finfish aquaculture farms in England and Wales) will be characterised and compared. We will quantify the abundance of AMR bacteria and genes using state-of-the-art sequencing, metagenomics and bioinformatics approaches; and the abundance of commensurate antibiotics, degradation products and metabolites using chromatography and mass spectrophotometry techniques. These data will then inform investigations into the accumulation of key antimicrobials (individually and as mixtures), their metabolites and transformation by-products within a Pacific Oyster (Crassostrea gigas) model when exposed to environmentally relevant levels of antibiotics. We will also determine the dynamics of AMR gene transfer within bacterial (Vibrio) communities that naturally colonise the Oysters under the same conditions. These data will be used to model the environmental fate of antibiotics, and the impact of low concentrations of these compounds on AMR transfer, using transmission dynamic models incorporating density dependent processes.
Funding Notes
This project is one of a number that are in competition for funding from the NERC GW4+ DTP. Studentships will provide a stipend (currently £14,297 pa), training support fee and UK/EU tuition fees for 3.5 years.
All studentships are available to applicants who have been resident in the UK for 3 years or more and are eligible for home fee rates. Some studentships may be available to UK/EU nationals residing in the EU but outside the UK. Applicants with an International fee status are not eligible for funding.
For more information, please see here: http://www.bath.ac.uk/science/graduate-school/research-programmes/funding/nerc-gw4-dtp/index.html
References
1. https://www.theguardian.com/society/2016/sep/20/un-declaration-antibiotic-drug-resistance
2. http://amr-review.org/home
3. Wellington E, Boxall A, Cross P et al. The role of the natural environment in the emergence of antibiotic resistance in Gram-negative bacteria. The Lancet Infectious Diseases 2013; 13: 155-165.