ANTIMICROBIAL RESISTANCES

Modern human medicine relies on the availability of effective antibiotic agents. Major surgeries, organ transplants, and the treatment of immune-suppressed patients would be unthinkable in the absence of antimicrobial therapy. The rapid and global spread of antibiotic resistance is therefore alarming. However, there is currently little quantitative knowledge about the driving processes which is urgently needed in order to be able to establish powerful strategies minimizing or even stopping the dissemination of antibiotic resistance. Our overarching aim is to contribute to a deeper mechanistic understanding of the emergence, persistence and dissemination of antibiotic resistance genes and resistant bacteria in the aquatic environment. Therefore, experiments are complemented with mathematical modeling (ODE and ABM). Moreover, statistical models are employed to detect and summarize trend in empirical data. In our experiments it is particularly important to us that the process rates determined in the laboratory correlate with those in the environment. We are interested in how environmental parameters effect vertical and horizontal gene transfer as well as the persistence of antibiotic resistance genes in different compartments (planktonik phase, biofilm).

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