Finding achilles heel: investigating how to control major bacterial pathogens

Bacterial infection remains a major cause of morbidity and mortality with hospital acquired infections still common. The increase in numbers of bacterial which are AMR (antimicrobial resistant) makes prevention of infection more important than ever. The hospital environment is a reservoir for pathogens which are often AMR and cleaning and disinfection is critical to preventing infection. However, there is currently a lack of knowledge about how many of the active agents used in disinfection act, how bacteria respond to exposure to these agents and whether resistance can develop and if this will also affect antibiotic resistance. This project is a partnership between the Quadram Institute and GAMA healthcare which will address these issues. The Quadram Institute has recently developed new methods to study the role of all genes in a bacterium in response to any given stress. This technology (based on use of massive transposon mutant libraries) will be applied here to understand the responses of key pathogens to important agents critical to infection prevention. The aim of the project is to generate data that will help develop the next generation of infection control products to help control the threat from AMR bacterial infections.