Prof Willem Van Schaik explains how researchers from across disciplines are needed to jointly realise potential of AMR genomics
100 years ago, we did not have antibiotics.
The reality is that if antimicrobial resistance is left to continue at its current pace, we may be running out of antibiotics before the end of this century. It is hard for most generations, including my own, to imagine a time when infections, even relatively minor ones, were not treated with some form of antibiotic. In pre-antibiotic times, these infections could result in death or life-altering disability.
Antibiotics are one of the most important discoveries in modern medicine. They have saved millions of lives and have cured an incredible number of painful and debilitating infections. However, the rising threat of antimicrobial resistance risks this most important class of medicines that we currently have at our disposal for treating infections.
Modern advances in microbiology mean that we have a nearly unimaginable ability to understand the genetic information of pathogens causing infectious diseases.
The ability to sequence the genome of a pathogen and spot genes and mutations that mean it evades our usual medical interventions can give us the upper hand in infection control.
Genomic surveillance came to the forefront during the COVID-19 pandemic when it informed global health agencies, governments and medicine manufacturers and supported the ability to understand how new variants would change the dynamics of the pandemic. By sequencing variants of concern, vaccines could be optimised to ensure that they were still able to help us develop immunity to the virus.
The time is now ripe to use genomic surveillance to tackle the urgent issue of AMR. Using rapid and cost-effective genome sequencing, we will be able to rapidly identify antibiotic-resistant pathogens, understand their spread and to design novel therapies and interventions.
Previous studies have shown that routine genome sequencing can be:
However, the progress in the field of AMR genomics is currently only translating to a limited extent to systematic improvements in healthcare, food safety and veterinary medicine.
With the democratisation of sequencing technologies, the ongoing revolution in artificial intelligence, combined with the UK’s significant knowledge base in genomics and other disciplines, there exists a unique opportunity to create a truly transdisciplinary dialogue in which researchers can collaborate across disciplines with the aim to deliver far-reaching impact and position the UK as an enduring global leader in the AMR genomics space.
There are many challenges to taking AMR genomics from the bench to the bedside, barnyard and beyond.
Many of the key remaining research gaps require transdisciplinary solutions, for example, economic research to make the case for scaled genomic surveillance in routine diagnostics and surveillance, research into the ethics around sample collection and data sharing, and social research to agree common goals around AMR genomics across health system stakeholders.
Hence, much of the remaining challenges in this field relate to the lack of opportunity for multiple disciplines and partners to come together, understand each other, and achieve a collective vantage point from which to develop and deliver truly transformative translational innovations.
With thanks to funding from UKRI, we are launching the TARGet research network to bring researchers from across the academy to tackle these challenges.
TARGet seeks to provide this platform for the large, multi-disciplinary community of UK researchers that study different aspects of genomics to tackle the global challenge of AMR. The network will break down disciplinary silos that inhibit progress and translation in the AMR genomics field and deliver on the promises of AMR genomics to improve human and animal health.
TARGet will support a range of activities that build towards enabling transdisciplinary working among researchers and stakeholders in the public and private sector, through a series of online and in-person meetings.
Professor Willem Van Schaik
Director of the Institute of Microbiology and Infection at the University of Birmingham
TARGet Network lead
Head of Research of the School of Infection, Inflammation and Immunology
Contact information and biography for Professor Willem van Schaik, Professor of Microbiology at the University of Birmingham.
