I’m grateful that our group could contribute German wastewater samples to this truly collaborative dataset of 1240 sewage metagenomes from 111 countries.

The study provides one of the most comprehensive comparisons between acquired ARGs and latent ones identified through functional metagenomics.

In-person participation for the workshop (free of charge) is limited to 40 places and will be allocated on a first-come, first-served basis. To register, send an email to [email protected] indicating your interest in attending.

3/3

As part of our new EU Project “One Bridge”, led by the University of Patras, we are organizing an 'AMR & #OneHealth Workshop in Dresden, Germany on the 6th of October 2025. The workshop will take place at BUSINESSPARK DRESDEN, Bertolt-Brecht-Allee 22-24, 01309 Dresden from 8:30 – 17:00.

2/3

Our findings urge a #OneHealth rethink of antibiotic use in aquaculture.

Check the full study led by Jin Huang (Central South University) & Bing Li (Tsinghua Uni Shenzhen Graduate School) here:

www.nature.com/articles/s44...

🚨Key message🚨
Regulations based solely on chemical residues overlook microbial risks. Withdrawal times must also consider ARG abundance, mobility, and pathogen enrichment to protect food safety & the environment.

7/8

Nearly half of the enriched potential pathogens (e.g., Aeromonas, Vibrio, Citrobacter) carried ARGs identical to those on plasmids, showing strong plasmid–chromosome links for resistance spread.

6/8

Resistance genes weren’t just more abundant, they were also more mobile! Integrons, transposons (carrying floR), and diverse plasmids persisted after withdrawal, keeping ARGs ready for transfer.

5/8

ARG abundance spiked up to 17× during treatment. It dropped after stopping antibiotics but stayed significantly above control levels even long past the 15-day withdrawal time required for residue compliance.

4/8

We simulated standard (5 & 10 days) and prolonged (30 & 90 days) florfenicol treatments in common carp and tracked gut microbiota, ARGs, and mobile genetic elements (MGEs) before, during, and after treatment.

3/8

We reveal that antibiotic resistance #AMR risks in fish farming don’t stop after the legal withdrawal time. Our study shows that oral florfenicol in carp leaves a lasting “resistome” footprint even after fish are deemed market-ready.

2/8

Big thanks to co-authors Peiju Fang, Bing Li, Xia Yu, Dominic Frigon, Kerry Hamilton, Hunter Quon, Thomas Berendonk & Magali de la Cruz Barrón. Also to the Explore-AMR project that allowed me to spend a month at @tsinghuauniversity.bsky.social where this paper's concept and outline were created.
3/3

We argue that, in addition to quantification, assessing which and what proportion of ARGs can move via MGEs is key for predicting environmental #AMR risks. We outline tools, from ddPCR linkage to hybrid metagenomics, to make this part of routine monitoring and integrate it into QMRA.

2/3

Data & R code are open:
🔗 github.com/enviresist/P...
Interactive lookup: enviresist.github.io/PNEC_res

This could help set antibiotic discharge limits that truly protect against AMR selection in the environment. 🧬💊
🌍🛡

9/9

In conclusion:

Our framework is:
💊grounded in ecology & evolution
💊transparent & easy to compute
💊adjustable to different risk tolerances
💊ready for use in environmental AMR regulation
💊easily updateable when new cost or MIC data emerges

8/9

Next, we created a probabilistic model of resistance cost distributions. Instead of a fixed “/10” factor, we now use a probabilistic cost tied to a chosen protection level.

Example: To protect against selection for 95% of resistances, you’d use ~1/250 of MIClowest (25x lower than before).

7/9

Next, we used published data to map the global distribution of plasmid-borne resistance costs. Plasmid borne resistance is the most worrying type, because plasmids spread ARGs fast across species and surprisingly cheaper on average than chromosomal resistance costs.

6/9

We tested it:
26 strain–antibiotic pairs
13 antibiotics, 3 model bacteria, plasmid & chromosomal resistance
➡ 66% of predicted MSCs were within a factor of 2 of experimental values!

5/9