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Project title

Water JPI Project - Stopping Antibiotic Resistance Evolution in the Environment (StARE)

Primary Funding Agency

Environmental Protection Agency

Co-Funding Organisation(s)

n/a

Lead Organisation

Maynooth University (MU)

Lead Applicant

Fiona Walsh

Project Abstract

According to WHO, antibiotic resistance is a global threat for human health, driven by many interconnected factors, where water plays a key role. Urban wastewater treatment plants (UWTPs) are major sources of antibiotic residues, resistant bacteria (ARB) and resistance genes (ARG) into the environment and, therefore, represent crucial control points for efficient technological intervention. Though ARB&G are well characterized clinically, their occurrence in aquatic environments, relation to the regional use of antibiotics, or temporal/geographical variations are poorly understood. StARE will investigate a high number of European UWTPs to evaluate ARB&G abundance versus chemical contamination and regional backgrounds. Guidelines for ARB&G monitoring in water will be developed. The efficiency, impact and cost-effectiveness of advanced wastewater technologies will be evaluated, based on an innovative biological risk control strategy. The multidisciplinary StARE team is based on a previous European collaboration supported by the COST Action TD0803. The Action delegates identified the major gaps in knowledge and the measures necessary to limit the spread of ARB&G. The objectives of StARE will fill these gaps, contributing to preventing the contamination of the environment and the food chain and supporting the revision of EU water directives, aimed at maintaining ecosystem services and public health protection. The findings of this research will be communicated through different channels and using messages with different levels of complexity to the general public and stakeholders. We expect to publish several peer-reviewed publications on the different topics within this proposal. We will develop testing guidelines and collate the final results and information into a report. These will be of particular interest to national and EU water policy makers. The international nature of this research collaboration will ensure that Irish researchers are at the forefront of water research. This will enable us to apply for and leverage EU funding, e.g. Horizon 2020.

Grant Approved

�149,948.02

Research Hub

Healthy Environment

Research Theme

Safe water

Start Date

15/12/2014

Initial Projected Completion Date

15/12/2017