Antimicrobial resistance and pollutants: interactive studies and novel sensor technologies

抗菌素耐药性(AMR)是现代医疗保健的主要威胁。由于印度是人均抗生素使用量最高的国家之一，它面临着非常重大的挑战。现在也知道，在环境(如水)中发现的抗药性微生物有助于耐药性的转移，认识到这一点，世界卫生组织全球行动认识到水所起的重要作用。这里特别重要的是污染物促进AMR的方式。例如，水中的重金属与AMR相关。同样，三氯生等化合物的广泛使用(例如，在肥皂、洗发水、牙膏中)正导致AMR发展为一系列临床重要的抗生素。然而，人们对污染物和AMR之间的这个问题和联系知之甚少。因此，我们有这样一种情况，在印度，抗生素使用率和AMR水平非常高，污染物水平很高，这将加剧问题。这项提议汇集了赫里奥特·瓦特大学领导的一个团队，包括世界领先的印度理工学院罗基学院、印度理工学院马德拉斯学院、詹姆斯·赫顿研究所和爱丁堡大学，Focus，积极和长期的跨学科合作。这个团队将开发新的传感器来检测和监测污染物，重点研究AMR共选择器，以提高对这些污染物如何调节和影响AMR的理解。WP1：识别用于污染物预浓缩(潜在地从源头去除)的新型聚合物，并将其集成到传感器中。WP2：开发新的传感器来检测和监测重金属、抗菌剂和AMR基因。WP3：创建低成本的纸基污染物传感器。WP4：创建易于使用、强大、低成本集成检测系统。WP5：进行案例研究，以确定印度和英国试验场的主要AMR基因和污染物水平，并验证检测方法的性能。作为我们影响和参与活动的一部分，我们将为最终用户提供信息和解决方案，帮助解决与印度水质问题相关的重大AMR问题。通过利用我们在整个团队中国际领先的科学和工程卓越的广度，该团队将利用该领域研究人员所需的能力，实施和部署负担得起的实用技术，帮助促进印度国内的可持续经济增长和福利。

Antimicrobial resistance (AMR) represents a major threat to modern healthcare. Since India has one of the highest per capita uses of antibiotics it faces very significant challenges. It is also now known that antibiotic-resistant microbes found in the environment (e.g. water) contribute to the transfer of resistance and in recognition of this the World Health Organisation Global Action recognises the important role played by water. Of particular importance here is the way in which pollutants promote AMR. For example heavy metals in water correlates with AMR. Likewise the wide scale use of compounds such as triclosan (e.g. in soaps, shampoos, toothpaste) is leading to the development of AMR to a range of clinically important antibiotics. However this issue and link between pollutants and AMR is poorly understood. Thus we have a scenario where in India we have very high-levels of antibiotic use and AMR and high levels of pollutants that will exacerbate the problem.This proposal brings together a team lead by Heriot Watt University and includes the world leading Indian Institute of Technology Roorkee, the Indian Institute of Technology Madras, the James Hutton Institute and the University of Edinburgh, building focused, proactive and long-term interdisciplinary partnerships.This team will develop novel sensors to detect and monitor pollutants focussing on studying AMR co-selectors to improve the understanding of how these pollutants mediated and impact AMR with five integrated work-packages that willWP1: Identify novel polymers for pollutant pre-concentration (potentially removal at source) and integration into sensors.WP2: Develop novel sensors to detect and monitor heavy metals, antimicrobials and AMR genes.WP3: Create low-cost paper-based sensors for pollutants.WP4: Create easy-to-use, robust, low-cost integrated detection systems.WP5: Undertake case studies to identify the main AMR genes and levels of pollutant at test sites in India and the UK, and validate the performance of detection methods.As part of our impact and engagement activities we will provide end-users with information and solutions that will help tackle the significant AMR problem that is linked to India's water quality issues. By leveraging the breadth of our international leading science and engineering excellence across the entire team the team will implement and deploy affordable and practical technologies with the capabilities required by researchers in the field helping to promote sustainable economic growth and welfare within India.